Arroyo Seco

tagged:

Angeles National Forest

We drove up Windsor and grabbed a spot on the side in the not-strictly-legal-but-left-unticketed spots in the painted out section of the lot. Getting a spot is always a matter of luck. Lots of people come here throughout the day, but many don't stay very long. Today, "we" includes Suzy and her two boys. It seems hiking with a small child before served me well in what to expect this time. Suzy hadn't been down this trail, but I suspected it would be quite good for our small group. We skipped over the JPL driveway and snaked past the gate and started down the pavement. We thought we were clear of traffic after the gate, but the bicycles seem to zoom past.

lots of water coming down the side creek
The first bridge is a tributary with plenty of flow today.


We got to the first bridge and found lots of water flowing down the tributary it crosses. Usually this creek is dry or a trickle. This seemed promising until the first bridge over the main creek which showed very little flow below. It was really puddles.

A frame bridge along the road
The second bridge is a big A frame with signs claiming it has been damaged by the fire and cones to keep vehicles to the center where they should be anyway since that's where the tracks are. Below, the creek trickles.

splashing water on the young walker
The day is hot, so the drinking fountain is welcome, if a little hard to reach, for our youngest hiker.

The day was hot and sometimes the shade trees don't come often enough. We got to the fork and kept left to stay in the canyon. Just past the fork, the road finally turns to dirt for a little nicer walking. The youngest hiker seemed to be getting a little cranky, so it was time to do something else. We found a nice trail down to the creek with no poison oak and only a couple raspberries for some water play. At the end of it was a very nice spot where the creek, now flowing much better, has a long wide spot of small gravel. Shoes off, it was a perfect wading pool.

wading in the creek
The youngest hiker carefully avoiding all the bugs (that he can see) as we head into the creek.

upstream view
I was tasked with taking a photo upstream, so here it is. Then I was tasked with taking a picture of everything in the world over the next 320 hours.  We'll see.

water plants at the edge
Although the middle of the creek is clear, there are plenty of water plants taking root at the edges.

Eventually we decided it was time to head back for some lunch, so we got our shoes back on and headed back down the road. Somehow there weren't any cranky noises all the way back.

little water snake slipping away
Spotted a cute little water snake on the way out of the water.




©2013 Valerie Norton
Posted 21 May 2011
location: N. Windsor Ave. and Ventura St., Altadena, CA, USA

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