Moments in Dirt and Ink

The sketches for the month. The large oak on the east side of Cottam Camp in Blue Canyon . The blue rocks upstream of Cottam Camp in Blue Canyon . A small sheltered hole along the stream below Tangerine Falls . The red cliffs along Agua Caliente .

Los Padres National Forest Map link. Agua Caliente Trail once provided a fairly direct route between ranger stations at Pendola and Potrero Seco (the later now just a campground) connecting to a couple other trails along the way. The route is likely to still be traversable, but actual trail finding may not be possible after about 4 miles. On the Potrero Seco side, a couple OHV routes follow increasingly close to the old route of the trail, but that isn't the side I hiked. On the Pendola side, the trail starts at a warm spring. The water is directed into a deep tub and the area is popular just for coming to soak in the naturally heated water. The trail heads out from the end of the road, past a debris dam, and generally follows the creek up. Access can be blocked by the closure of one of two gates on the dirt roads, usually due to weather. The roads are currently getting a little bad, but are kept up to be passable by passenger vehicles until a deep water ford just arou...

Santa Barbara front country Map link. My sister and her husband wanted a hike while they were in town, so I needed to find something that wasn't too long or upward facing, but of course still wanted to get somewhere. I decided to go up San Ysidro again to see the little waterfall. It was quite crowded when we got there, but there were a few spaces left. Getting to the trailhead, we found a table was set up nearby to give runners in the successor to the 9-trail race some water. We saw a few runners going both directions as we headed up the trail. The trail starts off at the end of that bit of East Mountain Road and progresses up between two properties to a private road, then follows a dirt path on the stream side along that for a bit before leaving the houses. There was a nice little flow down in the stream a short way below the level of the road. Then the pavement ends at a gate and the trail follows the dirt road for a bit. A signed trail leads to the right at the g...

Santa Barbara Front Country Locate the trailhead. It finally rains a nice, soaking rain and I get tempted to go chasing after waterfalls. Sure, a soaking rain doesn't actually run off so much and the waterfall won't actually be spectacular yet, but the temptation can be quite great. Also, I'd found that this one had a route (as opposed to a trail) that takes one to the bottom of the waterfall and then connects with the trail above. I was a little suspicious about the connection as a reasonable route, but decided to try it. I got myself up to Cold Spring trailhead again and wandered up the trail, this time turning left at the sign to head up the main and west forks of the stream. Well... except I left the water behind in doing so. I continued on to the waterfall in spite of now following a dry creek bed. Some great rocks along the trailside. But then I can hear water again... except it's coming through the pipe that travels along the trail. ...

Bronson Canyon Park Locate the trailhead. I joined the geeks for another hike, this one to pass through the old "Bat Cave" of the Batman TV show and up to the Hollywood sign. I was sort of in the neighborhood and I have managed to never be anywhere near the remains of the Hollywoodland sign, so I thought I might go. Besides, Bat cave! So I got there and waited for more to come and found some new folks trying it out for the first time and then a few old folks and finally our leader, uncharacteristically late. Once gathered, we headed up the road and took the right at a fork to get to the "cave". Apparently, this is the Bat Cave, or at least the entrance, even though it is not a cave at all. After poking around the tunnel, which had a couple more off it before getting all the way through, we headed back to the fork and took the left to start climbing toward the sign. We had a fair bit of up to do to get up to it, but initially went a little bit ...

Los Padres National Forest 8th of November, 2011 Map the trailhead. Following hiking the front country half of Cold Spring, I decided to hike (some of) the back country portion of the trail. There were no threats of rain coming the next day, so it was nice and clear when I got to the spot the trail crosses Camino Cielo. I got out the camera to take a photo of the great expanse of land to the north and sea to the south that I hadn't been able to see when I climbed up to this spot and the camera said "change the batteries". Whoops. Once I had the same batteries in a flashlight, now I don't. They had been charged just a few days earlier, so should have been fine. It might really be time to change the batteries, but for now I tossed it back into the car and headed off a half pound lighter than I would have. And took a few more moments to take in the sea of sea and sea of mountains. Taking Cold Spring into the backcountry offers a few options. The sign at...

Santa Barbara Front Country Map the trailhead. I hiked up Cold Spring trail from E. Mountain up to E. Camino Cielo and hit Montecito peak on the way back down. I started off well enough. I got directions from the Independent that told me to turn on Foothill/192 from Hot Springs, then down Cold Spring and park by the creek. I missed 192 because it is actually Sycamore, so got to Mountain and turned toward Cold Spring, thus finding the trail head which is on Mountain a bit east of the road called Cold Spring. I guess sometimes two wrongs do make a right. Three trails apparently leave from the creek. The one on the west side just goes far enough to find a good place to cross and then joins the main trail. The easternmost trail climbs to join the main trail much further up forming the other side of "the loop", if the map the Independent had is more accurate than their directions. The middle trail is the main trail and is signed with mileages for various destinations...