Acton, CA - Next Time

Mostly I’ll just show you pictures of our hike today. We are in Acton, CA, just northwest of LA and on the north side of the Angeles Forest. We’ve been here before and the view that draws our eyes is of the ridge line behind us. What a line - almost straight and towering over the countryside below.

Hard to believe that over the ridge are the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles. On this side of the ridge are the quiet and solitude of hiking among the hills.

We’ve actually seen switchbacks on it heading up through the foothills to the crest so we know that others have hiked this way. One day we tried to find a road to get to the bottom of them so where we could start our hike. We’ve tried several roads in the area and couldn’t find anything. Meanwhile we found another hike to take. Fun but not up to a ridge line. Maybe next time, we said.

This is the next time but, we’re going to try the Pacific Crest Trail to the ridge line. It crosses the road in front of the campground 4 miles further south and there is an actual trail head there. At the trail head there is a rutted dirt road, blocked off, which heads up into the hills - probably a fire road. As usual, we were the only ones at the trail head and we saw only one other person, must be a local, walking his dog along the road, ‘keeping his gears lubed’ he told us.

We headed up the trail, around the foothills with ever widening views as we hiked upward. We crossed the road and looked off towards the next crest and saw a track team, outlined against the sky, heading down it. Right down the crest, some running, some walking but all dressed the same. Hey, why are some school kids running now, at 10:00? Don’t they have school? Hmmm. Later we looked more closely at the pictures and a better question is: why are they all wearing orange jump suits? Orange jump suits? I know of only one group that wears orange jump suits.

We could see our campground off in the distance below.

But the views of all the surrounding hills was great. Makes it all worth while.

We continued hiking until 1:00 and found this cozy spot for lunch.

Up one more hill to see how close we were to the ridge line and back down, then up, then down, then up again. Lots of wildflowers along the trail.

Whew, we finally got to the spot where the road crosses the trail and - took the road down - steep but fast.

We saw these cute little slides on the way down the road. As Gary tossed a rock in, he told me that all young boys toss rocks in slides to see them go down. And, his bounced out. Aha, I’m a girl, I can do better than that and I found a smaller, flatter rock and gently put it into the slide. Oh, shucks, my rock bounced out too. Hey, Gar, maybe we can slide down - wouldn’t that make the hike shorter? Nah, we’re almost there.

And, we’re down. Did we make it to the ridge line? Nope. maybe next time. But we had a good hike among the canyons and valleys, the lizards and wild flowers, the rocks and the brush. We had a marvelous walk.

And, I end with a quote from Cheryl Strayed from her book: Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail. If you want a good book about challenging yourself, finding yourself and accomplishing goals, or if you want just a plain ol’ good book to curl up with, here’s my recommendation.

‘It had nothing to do with gear or footwear or the backpacking fads or philosophies of any particular era or even with getting from point A to point B. It had to do with how it felt to be in the wild. With what it was like to walk for miles with no reason other than to witness the accumulation of trees and meadows, mountains and deserts, streams and rocks, rivers and grasses, sunrises and sunsets. The experience was powerful and fundamental. It seemed to me that it had always felt like this to be a human in the wild, and as long as the wild existed it would always feel this way.’

                                Cheryl Strayed, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail