San Jacinto 2002

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Summary
San Jacinto Summit Climb: 09 June 2002

Detail
San Jacinto: June 8-9, 2002

Mike, Nancy, Tone and I ( Terri ) headed out for a backpacking trip to Mt. San Jacinto State Park around 7 a.m. on a Saturday. We took two cars, so Tone and I gave Mike and Nancy a call on Nancy's cell phone. Turned out they were about 20 minutes ahead of us, so Nancy said she'd call back when they were nearly there. This, as it turned out, was a bad idea. We just hadn't realized it yet.

The four-hour drive passed uneventfully; traffic was minimal. When Tone and I arrived at the Palm Springs Aerial Tram that would take us up to the park, I noticed my cell phone signal was dead. How long it had been like that I don't know, but there was no way to get hold of Nancy and Mike at that point. We did see Nancy's car in the overnight camping lot, so we figured we'd meet them at the top of the tram. In any case, it was hot as hell down where we were, and since the temperature up there was 15 or 20 degrees cooler than on the desert floor, heading up seemed the best recourse. We bought our ticket then went up the mountain. The tram floor rotates ( a little over twice ) during the ascent to give you an all-around view of the scenery, which was pretty cool. But it did get old listening to everyone gasp in horror at every bounce or shift of the tram.

When we got to the top, Nancy and Mike were nowhere in sight. We hung around a bit, but eventually decided to hike up to camp and meet them there. It was an easy, three-mile hike in to the Tamarack Valley campground, but because there was no water up there, carrying a gallon and a half of water each did add some challenge to it. Round Valley, the closest campground to the tram, was about a half mile closer, but that little extra bit of walking was more than worth it. Round valley is big, and packed with people; Tamarack was nearly empty, with only 12 campsites spread out among tall evergreens so we couldn't even see our nearest neighbors. In fact, it took us quite a bit of time to find a half-dozen or more of the campsites.

Tone and I laid down our packs at the first site we found, by name Quartz. Still no Mike and Nancy. And precisely because Tamarack is so spread out, it was going to be quite an adventure trying to find them. We wandered around, at first disoriented by the crappy map on the back of our free permit. But with the help of Tone's GPS, we mapped most sites in the campground, so at least we knew where WE were. Five hours after we'd first arrived at the tram, we gave up hope that our camping partners were waiting for us and headed back toward the tram to track them down. Not even five minutes into our walk, lo and behold, there were Nancy and Mike! I nearly kissed them. Finally, we set up camp. Nancy and Mike cooked a fabulous dinner of pasta with alfredo sauce on Mike's very cool camp stove. Not being much of a cook, I contributed bread and cheese. Tone made himself useful constructing a table and bench out of rocks and logs. Afterward, it was still light out, so we headed out for a short climb of Mt. Cornwall, a pointed, rocky summit visible from the campground. It was a beautiful view albeit windy as hell, and Mike and Tone even caught the sunset at the top. Afterward we played Hearts with the help of our really cool LED head lamps.

The next morning we set out to climb to the top of San Jacinto -- about another four miles to the 10,834-foot peak. We ascended through pine trees, meadows and scrub brush and ran into quite a few other hikers. About halfway up we stopped at Wellman's Divide, which had great views. At the summit we had lunch, and then each of us used Nancy's cell phone to call our families and say, "Hey, I'm at the top of San Jacinto!" Horrible hiking etiquette, I know, but it was fun to do anyway. On the way down we took a more direct route, using an old, overgrown trail, and, of course, Tone's GPS. It was only about 1 p.m. when we got back to camp, so we all decided to take a nap before striking camp and heading out. Tone and I had already taken our tent partway down that morning -- a precautionary measure against the strong winds that had uprooted our stakes and nearly carried the tent away, sleeping bags and all. We all headed back to the tram, our packs blissfully light without all that water, and rode back down to our cars. Despite our earlier cell phone problems, we did manage to successfully contact Mike and Nancy so we could stop at a roadside Denny's on the way home.

San Jacinto GPS Waypoints
Here are some of the GPS waypoints I recorded on this trip. These points are in Degree.MinuteSeconds, not Decimal Degrees.

Click the GPS image for the Waypoint+ (Waypoint Plus) file for a Garmin eTrex.

Select San Jacinto GPS Waypoints
DOWNHS	Down Out House in Tamarack Valley	33.483618300	-116.3933839000
OUTHSE	Twin Out Houses	33.480695700	-116.3952838000
TAMRCK	Tamarack Valley Sign	33.483346300	-116.3938338000
DAVID	Camp site??	33.482604400	-116.3929897000
MALORY	Camp site??	33.482932400	-116.3925254000
DIORIT	Camp Site: Diorite	33.483796000	-116.3949095000
QUARTZ	Camp Site: Quartz	33.483876800	-116.3932456000
FELDSP	Camp Site: Feldspar	33.483415900	-116.3933836000
PEGMAT	Camp Site: Pegmatite	33.483697100	-116.3935231000
IRVINE	Camp Site: Irvine	33.483117600	-116.3932166000
PYRITE	Camp Site: Pyrite	33.483359300	-116.3925944000
JACINO	Jacinto Peak	33.485303000	-116.4045932000
JCRANG	Jacinto Ranger Station	33.484502300	-116.3832088000

See some images of our trip.