Tuesday morning I knocked off a couple peaks along the Santa Clara divide road along its lonely path to Magic Mountain.
Met some friendly deer hunters at the trailhead. No luck for them this morning, they were going to try again the next day. FYI this is zone D11 for deer hunting.
It was cool, dry and brisk. I pushed and rode my bike up the road, admiring how even more gaping the washout had become. It might be bigger now than when Keith was here in May. https://eispiraten.com/viewtopic.php?p= ... eld#p69129
I sometimes pushed, sometimes rode my bike up the road until reaching the point to jump off to bag point 3650 where I stashed the bike, and pushed through some knee-high wildflowers to the summit. Shrubs are still only knee high 8 years after the Sand Fire. No benchmark or cairn here, just big views of the western San Gabriel Mtns.
A view west along the divide, in the foreground being Pt 3657, which I did as a Christmas eve hike with my father in 2021. That one was quite a bit more challenging.
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And to the east, the front range doing its thing. I could name all the peaks, but almost got thrown by an unfamiliar silhouette of San Gabriel peak.
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Back down to the bike, stashing it again another mile up the road where I wanted to follow the ridge line to get to Garfield.
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Garfield was a breeze. A faint use trail I could follow on the way up, and it never got steep. And this one had a benchmark with a name and everything, sitting in a big pile of 1.5 billion year old Mendenhall Gneiss. Fun!
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Back down on the east ridge to the road was even easier, as the Dagger Flat trail is in pretty decent condition, at least up here on the ridge line. Not sure if I'm going to take this trail all the way down on my radius. It doesn't really help me for any of the routes I have planned.
It was a lovely cruise back down to the Little Tujunga Road and my car, barely had to even use my brakes - the bicycle was really a perfect tool for this route.
Garfield was my first hike of the 12 mile radius, being just over 11 miles from my home. I've already planned out about 25-30 routes in this mile wide ring that will probably keep me busy enough for a couple years. Lots more adventures to come! 8.01 miles, 1728 of gain.
