Moments in Dirt and Ink

Sketches for the month. Baldy hiding behind a tree across Vincent Gap . The creek by the campground. The view from near the lookout location on South Mount Hawkins . A bit of fog. Kelp on the beach.

Angeles National Forest Locate the trailhead. When doing the loop of trails out of Crystal Lake that brought me up to the top of Islip, I noted that the map I was handed marked a trail along Hawkins Ridge as well, allowing for another loop that stops by the two Mt. Hawkins. To do it, I again traveled up to Windy Gap, then turned east along the Pacific Crest Trail, the only direction I hadn't yet traveled from Windy Gap that contained a trail. Climbing up, the ridge trail leaves to the south, then a trail to Lily Spring. The mountain rises as a cliff to the south and at the far side, a trail proceeds up the top of Mt. Hawkins. Proceeding back to the ridge trail, I traveled down along the ridge down to South Mt. Hawkins. After taking in the view from there, I traveled back along the fire road until it crossed the trail and followed the trail back down from there. The lot in the campground next to the trail head was still closed with most of the campground, so I parked behi...

Angeles National Forest Locate the trailhead and the end of the trail. After hiking over to Big Horn Mine, I stopped at Buckhorn to look for a camping spot so that I might hike around one of the many trails in the area again the next day as well completely neglecting that it was a three day weekend and the campground would be a madhouse. The sites were overfull with people packing three cars and over a dozen humans into sites that only allow two cars and eight people. I walked down the trail a short way to read for a bit, then turned to go home and found the sun to be at a level that completely blocked my vision when going in the direction the road goes. In the campground, I could just stop and get a view of where I was going, but I wouldn't want to miss a turn at speed. I decided to really see where the road at the end of (what is now) Buckhorn's exit really got to. I parked in the turnout in front of the old road and made my way up its water rutted route to near th...

Angeles National Forest Locate the trailhead. The area around Iron Mountain is riddled with mines. I've got a hike hitting many of those mines in my dream hikes, but that has not happened yet. While looking around the map for the various mines, I found one far up north that would be much easier to get to as it was down an unimproved road just a couple miles from the highway. Looking it up, I found that it is a popular hike that is still possible to make and that the cabin of the man the gap and gulch it starts at is named for can be viewed nearby. They say it follows the old wagon road to the mine, but I'm not so sure that's entirely true, although it is probably close enough. I printed out a map and headed to Vincent Gap. Vincent Gulch is a wide open valley heading down toward the San Gabriel River (prairie fork going to the east fork). Mount Baldy is visible in the background and the Blue Ridge is to the east. The trail starts next to the Pacific Cr...