Horse Ridge Lookout

Six Rivers National Forest

Shasta-Trinity National Forest

(map link)

I had gone up Horse Ridge Road (3S12 and even has a little horizontal sign at the bottom of the road) and found a camp area without too many dead trees in the immediate vicinity near the first big intersection of roads. That gave me a little over 4 miles to walk to the lookout, so that's where I started in the morning. At the next intersection, there would be (according to the map) a trail option for a short way. At the intersection after, there would be a trail to the road at the top, leaving just a short bit more on road to the lookout itself. The area is still in the footprint of the Hopkins Fire 2020, part of the August Complex that burned over 1 million acres. A firefighter who stopped in the afternoon to talk and educate said there was also an incident where some fool set off the piles, but that fire doesn't seem to be recorded on Caltopo.

00: tall trees line a line of smooth road — Starting off the day on good, but narrow road.

Travel was quick along the smooth, gently rolling road. There's not a lot of elevation gained on this part of the road getting to the next junction.

01: wooded peak and wooded hills — A window through the trees gives a view of Smith Peak, probably.

That next junction comes with a big, slanted meadow on the east side and view through the burned trees on the west. It didn't come with a trail splitting the difference between the two roads. I headed up the middle anyway. It's possible the "trail" is the mystery gated road that comes up from the left road (spur A, 3S12A). It certainly became decommissioned road by the end. It was likely used in some recent year as a logging road and wasn't getting much more interest to challenge the dirt mounds blocking it.

03: grassy meadow and trees — The meadow to the east with Van Horn Peak, let's say, rising a little higher than the rest.

05: flattened bits — The options present. The unused old road or the gently scraped fuel break?

I didn't really want the trail up to the lookout to be similar to the start of the first trail. After the short way to the next junction, I found it wasn't. It is, in fact, a Jeep trail. This junction represents the end of anything maintained for lower cars, but I probably could have driven that Jeep trail right up to the little loop of road about 2 miles from my camp. After that, it gets steep and soft and you might not even want to run your AWD on it. I didn't regret walking instead of driving. The day's hike was short enough already.

06: huge space of dirt — A massive junction at the end of 3S12 where Cedar Gap Road (2S02, high clearance) crosses and the 8E04 Jeep trail starts up the mountain.

07: oak reaching to the sun — A mighty oak beside a mighty rock beside a little road.

08: road lined with small oaks — The side road doesn't get much use.

09: white puffs above pointy leaves — A crown of arrowleaf buckwheat on a rock.

10: mountain views — The top of the side road is supper wide with a long view of distant peaks.

I started on the steep trail, much harder than the walk up until then. I found frequent excuses to stop a little, though. First was the marked spring. I didn't find it, at least not on the way up. It's marked a little too far up the hill. I did find plenty of monkeyflowers and other things that tend to moister areas.

13: monkeyflower in yellow — A few of the musk monkeyflowers.

14: grassy with a road running through it — A steep climb through a meadow gives a long view.

15: trillium with petals sticking strait up from the big leafy bracts — Giant white wakerobin, the only one found on the whole trip.

16: tall trees with black bark falling off the dead wood — Rather severe burn at the top of the road.

I reached the top of the Jeep trail without even having to jump over a fallen tree. The rest of the road was just as clear in spite of the bad burn that had taken the nearby forest.

17: clusters of blue flowers and holly like leaves — The local Ceanothus, mahala mat, was full of lovely blue flowers.

18: squat lookout in very good repair with the shutters up — Arriving at much shorter Horse Ridge Lookout.

Horse Ridge Lookout is still manned, which means you can get to look around a working lookout, but only if the person is around. The shutters were up and the radio squawking, but the gate in the fence and in the observation deck were locked quite tightly. No one was home, so I was restricted to the ground. As suggested by the height of the lookout, you can see quite a lot of the view from the ground.

19: lots of little mountains — The mad river side.

20: benchmark with an arrow — A reference mark for a locked up station at the high point of South Fork Mountain.

21: more trees in the way to see bigger mountains — A little harder to see out over South Fork Trinity River.

22: tall mountains with snow at the top — And what's that between here and the Trinity Alps?

23: column of puffy grey arising from the ground — Yep, there's a column of smoke.

25: purple flowers with tall, narrow leaves — Scytheleaf onions occupy a lot of the top.

It was only noon, loads and loads of daylight left, when I turned down. A much quicker hike than the day before. Admittedly, I got started earlier without the 2 hour drive to get there, too.

27: puffs of flowers with a butterfly and beetle — Carpets of one-seeded pussypaws were quite popular with the insects like this duskywing and beetle.

28: hirsute flower petals — Tiny Tolmie's pussy ears were along the edges.

29: tall trees — Big oaks and pines are in the area of the spring.

I followed the hints rather than the map and found the running water of the spring on my way down. The area is crowded with flowers.

30: green and brown insect — There were even dragonflies like this bison snaketail. They kept stopping by for the rest of the hike.

31: white simple flowers — Coastal manroot.

37: tiny hirsute flower — A tangle of small flowered Nemophila.

38: large, drab bird — The red tailed hawk takes flight.

39: showy flower — Bowltube irises were scattered in many places.

40: leaves and seeds — I wanted to see the fawn lilies, but of course it is too late for them now.

42: black and white butterfly — A pale swallowtail resting on one of the whitebark raspberries that did not get me this day.

44: white and green/brown butterfly — A large marble butterfly on a mountain jewelflower.

46: black and white moth — A wild forget-me-not moth on a grand bit of arrowleaf buckwheat.

47: black rocks, trees, mountains beyond — A little bit of the environment where the wild buckwheat grows.

I looped around on the extra loop of old road, which wasn't any longer than the used road. The purpose of it? I'd guess a mine. It didn't get on the map.

49: red flowers with long fringe — Cardinal catchfly.

50: mountains across the meadow — The light is much better for looking out southeast across the meadow now.

Once back to the good road, I stuck to it all the way back.

51: burst of purple — The biggest blue dicks I've ever seen are actually the close relative ookow.

52: butterfly on sparse flowers — A typical blue butterfly on western vervain.

55: red tubes of flowers — Firecracker flowers, another blue dick relative, going off everywhere.

56: animal with a puffy grey tail — The western grey squirrel has something to say while jumping about the branches.

So that's all the lookouts on South Fork Mountain visited. It was still mid afternoon, giving me plenty of time to read, boil up a pot of beans, and chat with the aforementioned fireman out of Ruth who gave me the low down on all the roads. This last winter hit some of the roads hard and there's some random drops of a foot out there. I think it's the first wet one since the big fire.

*even more photos*

The other lookouts on South Fork Mountain:
Pickett Peak Lookout | Cold Springs Lookout | Blake Mountain

©2023 Valerie Norton
Written 5 Jul 2023

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