Sunrise over Anza-Borrego Desert SP

Bonny Benchmark
Elevation: 4,574′

White Benchmark
Elevation: 5,326′

Total Mileage: 5.26

Trailhead Map (33.210596, -116.49509)

Sometimes the stars align and everything makes for a perfect hiking day. This was not one of those times. Granted, any day of hiking is better than doing almost anything else, but some conditions can be more challenging than others.

We got an early 4AM start. When I say “we” I mean the friends I will refer to as the She-wolf and Level 3. I’ve hiked with them before, on my trip to Villager and Rabbit Peaks. I was kicking around the idea of squeezing a hike in before I would have my daughter (Sophia) solo for about 2 weeks while my wife (Hoa) travels for business.

I mentioned taking a day off work to Level 3 and he asked if I wouldn’t mind if he came along. That sealed it. We had a plan and were going with it. Leading up to the day of hiking, I looked at the weather several times a day, and all signs said that all hell would break loose over San Diego on Friday afternoon.

We decided to get an early start. 4AM is pretty early, even for me, even when excited about hiking, which I was. We drove through Ramona in the dark, searching for someplace to get some pre-dawn breakfast. Jack-in-the-Box did the trick and we took a left in Santa Ysabel and continued north past Lake Henshaw.

Sunrise on Morena Butte from the Pacific Crest Trail

It’s amazing the excitement and anticipation I get when I am getting ready for a hike. I kick around the idea of whether or not to go throughout the week. I am conscious of the fact that whenever I am gone, I am not with my family. So it is always a trade-off.

However, the thought of exploring a new area, of seeing what the mountains look like from a new peak simply drives me forward and makes the idea of waking up at 4 or 5AM seem like a great idea.

This Sunday was no different. Depending on which direction I am going, the sun usually starts glowing behind the Cuyamacas while I am driving over the Mission Trails Summit on the 52 Freeway as it drops down into Santee. The temperature outside was 41 degrees, which wasn’t too cold. I also enjoy the view of El Cajon Mountain, which dominates the landscape on the way east on the Interstate 8 Freeway.

For me, it’s the exploration of the unknown, the physical challenge, the sense of accomplishing a peak. But overall, it’s the collecting of a new experience. Someone once said to me that they were a collector of experiences. And I think this is the greatest way to be.

Sure, I like to collect things, such as technological gadgets, like my iPhone, digital camera, and I like reading my iPad, but they are all simply tools to allow me to collect more and varied experiences.

Each trail and summit is a new experience worth collecting.

Gut Check's King of the Hill Series

Since the start of the New Year, I started up my exercise routine. Rather than a weekly hike (ideally), and an occasional 3-mile jog from my house, I started working out again with the incredible people at Gut Check Fitness.

This has required me to get up early (5:15AM) to the point that I can no longer sleep in on weekends. While my body has been feeling stronger, and often sore, I realized this weekend that there’s a lot left to do.

I participated in Gut Check Fitness’ King of the Hill Series race, the first of which ran up and down Woodson Mountain from Lake Poway. I had an arbitrary goal of two hours, which I met, but along the way, I didn’t feel as strong as I should have. Also, I bonked in the last half mile of the race. It didn’t help that the last stretch was a steep uphill to the finish line, coupled with 10 burpee pushups before the final climb. I felt dizzy and nauseous, something I don’t often feel when being active.

I am happy that I finished the race and I wasn’t dead last. Understandably, I just re-started my new fitness regimen, but my performance really let me know that I could be doing a lot more. And I was doing a lot more before I hurt my back a year and a half ago. The pain still nags me and it really flared up while ascending Woodson Mountain this weekend. The downhill was easier, but I still ran out of steam near the end.

Manza Benchmark from the ridge

This topic has been coming up a lot lately in my conversations: Have you ever met an unfriendly hiker?

In all sorts of other recreational activities, it seems like there are hotheads and inconsiderate people. But hikers, in my experience, reach some sort of meditative state where they are at some sort of peace with themselves. Hiking to them is not a race or athletic endeavor; it’s a journey or break from an otherwise chaotic life. The act of hiking is a calming process that balances the focus inward with the focus outward.

I bring this up because I met some especially nice hikers on my trip today.

I got another early start. I love driving in the dark on the way to a trail. It might be cold when I get there, but I love to feel nature wake up in the morning. The quiet sounds of birds waking up and the wind blowing gently through the trees are typically what I find once I set foot on the trail. I didn’t get that today.

View from the Trail in Santa Ysabel

There is a group of people that I come in contact with. They pour over maps and make note of every little high point, some that are named and some aren’t.

They sit at home and close their eyes, imagining what it would be like to look at the surrounding landscape from that vantage point. They look at contours and imagine routes up to the top when there are no trails. They wake up long before the sun rises and look forward to the time on the trail, many times alone with their breath and the animals crunching through the scrub. They look at the trail and see tracks of other visitors, mostly of the four-legged kind.

They enjoy getting to the top of something and a few scratches or bruises from yucca or boulders won’t get in their way.

I am one of these people.

There is a subset of people within this group. They will summit a peak at any cost, including climbing fences clearly marked with No Trespassing. I am not one of this group.

Although I’ve occasionally crossed barbed wire fencing, it is because the map clearly indicates that I am on public lands and there is no sign indicating that it would be trespassing. My intent is different than most. It’s not only bagging a peak, it’s also sharing what I’ve learned with others and encouraging others to go the same way as me. I will not encourage anyone to break a law, much less put it in writing and charge people for it.

Corte Madera Mountain from the Saddle

Well, we all make mistakes. And sometimes I make them more than once. I know better, I truly do. But sometimes it’s in our nature to try for the easy way out, which ends up by being not so easy.

We got a really early start in the morning, meeting at my local coffee shop at 5AM. After a few missed freeways exits due to heavy fog and lack of sleep, we got to the trailhead by 6AM. It was pretty quiet except for the birds. I had a feeling that this was trail that wasn’t visited very often.

We got started up the trail and the fog flowed around us. The hillsides and trail were pretty green from the recent rains and the cool air (in the 40s) felt good as we gained elevation. It had been over three months since Brady and I had been hiking together, so we caught up on our respective adventures as we hiked up the trail.

We got up near the saddle between Corte Madera and Los Pinos Mountains and turned around to get a peek into the valley behind us. The fog was lifting at lower elevations, but we were still ascending into the clouds.

Two of us on Van Dam Peak

I wanted Peak #50, wherever it would be, to be special. Perhaps a group of people could join me on the hike, or it could be on a well-known or very challenging peak.

Instead, I opted to share this particular hike with my wife, Hoa. My insistence on having her on this hike with me also delayed my hiking over the last few months, since having a young daughter rarely enables us to be free at the same time. My nieces also happen to be very busy, so the PD and his family don’t have a lot of time for babysitting, and I don’t want to impose unless their schedule is pretty light.

So, nearly three months after my last hike to El Cajon Mountain, I was celebrating the first days of the new year with my wife by climbing Van Dam Peak, an island of dark coastal sage scrub rising out of Sabre Springs.

The PD, atop Ant Benchmark

Many of you have asked on numerous occasions, “Who is the PD?” I’ve decided to dedicate this blog post just to him. Some of it might be true. Or not.

02-Sunrise over El Cajon Mountain

El Cajon Mountain
Elevation: 3675
Elevation Gain: 4,000′
Miles: ~11.2
Trailhead

Update 05/08/2012: This is one of the most popular pages on my site. Feel free to comment on how you got here and if and how you are using the information here. I’d love to interact with all of you.

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First of all, I’d like to congratulate Tom, a hiker I saw going up while I was on the way down, for being the first person to ever recognize me from this website while hiking on a trail. Pretty cool. I’m famous now. Tom, if you’re reading this, send me an email and I’ll send you something useful.

Now for the hike. This was the first time I even bagged a peak with a group, which was SoCal Hikers and Peakbaggers. It was a group of five of us that arranged carpooling and was led my Maya, a very capable hike leader.

We got to the trailhead and it was a cool morning. The way I like it. We headed up the road and started gaining elevation quickly. Once we warmed up, the first switchbacks didn’t seem that steep. Once we topped the first rise, we got a view of El Cajon Mountain in the mist. Our destination was miles away. It didn’t seem likely that we would get there today.

Sunrise on Guatay Mountain

Local lore has it that there is a Kumeyaay chief buried on Guatay Mountain and has visited town residents over the years. The chief is also cited as the reason that the mountain hasn’t burned in recorded history.

Not deterred by the possible existence of ghosts on the mountain, the PD and I left early, driving through foggy mist. San Diego had been drizzled on for over 24 hours and I was worried the trail to the top of Guatay would be soggy and slippery. I was pleasantly surprised when the fog lifted within the space of a few seconds just outside of Pine Valley.

We made it to the trail head in great time, but it was a little chilly at 43 F. After a false start when I realized that I had forgotten to put my Adventure Pass on my windshield, we geared up and started hiking our way up the trail, and, as we rounded a corner, we felt the sun shining on us. Within 5 minutes, we were stripping down to our base layers as the day and ourselves warmed up.