With headlamps on, we started at around 6am from Manker Flat parking area. Parts of the road leading to San Antonio Falls were covered with ice. So some caution was needed until we got to the rockier portions after the hairpin going away from the falls.

At the register, we shed some layers, ditched our headlamps, and carried on. The snow coverage on the trail itself was mixed until about a half mile in. Then it covered everything. There wasn’t any ice, and the snow was already a little slushy. So crampons weren’t needed. Just a little extra caution.

Charging up to the Ski Hut, we med up with the group from the San Gabriel Mountains Discussion Forum group who were holding an informal training clinic. We hung around for about an hour here meeting others and just waiting around for the last group members to get up to the Ski Hut. Unfortunately though, the group started up past our cutoff time of 9am. So Tim and I decided to leave the group and do our own thing. First off, we should his friend how to self-arrest. This was made difficult with the warm sun softening the snow a lot.

After about a half hour of this, we started our climb up the center. I’m not sure on the names of the chutes, I’m going to have to find those out later. But our goal was to head right up the center chute (where the rock formation comes to a saddle in this picture).

We were making some pretty good time up it too. Tim did a good job creating the path for us to follow. After about 40 minutes, we were three quarters or so up the Bowl. This is where Tim wanted to change course and start another approach up a different chute. I decided to stick to the original route, while Tim broke left and went about his approach.

Truong and I went up the intended chute. In the chute, the snow was just powder. I was pretty much post-holing mid-calf or up to my knee with each step. This got pretty tiring. On top of that, the snow was doing a good job of balling up on my crampons. This was extremely tiring and annoying. But at least at this steep portion, I wasn’t worried about a painful slide down the mountain if I messed up.

Finally at the top of the chute, it was pretty gusty. We Baldy looked like a chimney with the way the snow was coming off of it. Baldy itself looked pretty miserable too.

We were done for the day. No summit today. Been there, done that. Instead, we traversed the lip and started the glissade down.

Second half of the glissade:

The plan was to meet at 6:30 and head up at that time. But with some traffic and other delays, we did’t start until 7. I haven’t started a hike this early since before summer, so I was feeling tired right off the bat. But once we crossed snow on the trail, that all changed. The snow on the trail was already semi-paved for us so crampons weren’t necessary. Although we did break out the ice ax early.

We got to the ski hut at about 8:30, had a quick breakfast, and tied on our crampons. What a difference those make. From slippery snow to instant stability. I was loving it!

Our first order of business was for me to learn how to self-arrest. I had watched this video the previous night to supplement what Tim was teaching me. Check out the video, it’s pretty educational.

We did this for a good hour and got whizzed by a few rocks rolling down the mountain. Those things are scary. You don’t actually see them until you hear them flying by. And by then it’s already almost past. That’s when we implemented the rock watch.

Once the training was done, we started up. Our route would be the far western slope of the Bowl. All the other groups had taken the eastern approach which intersected with the Backbone Trail. We saw only 2 people going directly up the center. Those 2 must have been experienced because the view from the top looking down was insanely steep. Not quite vertical, but close to it.

As for our route, you can see it in the first picture. From the bottom of the Bowl, things looked pretty easy. It’s awfully deceiving though. Once past the halfway point, it gets steeper and steeper. At one point about 40 feet from the top, I lost Tim’s tracks and panicked for a few seconds. At a time like this, this is where experience comes in. The only other time I felt this kind of apprehension was in Falling Rock Canyon. Except this was worse.

With FRC, if you fell, you could probably count on slamming down on a outcrop of rocks after maybe a 10′ fall. Here though, as I looked down, I could actually visualize my path down. Looking left didn’t help either. This view gave me an excellent view of the slope in all of its steep glory. Therefore, I could calculate roughly the speed at which I would be travelling. And by my calculations, it would be fast.

So anyways, the panic that came over me was subdued with some mental focus and going over the fundamentals in my head. Which for me was, step, pick, step, repeat. Then it got really dicey when I noticed an ice patch that I was a few feet from. I hadn’t done any side-to-side practice, so I figured I should learn quickly.

I avoided the ice patch. Strafed my was over to the proper path. Then eventually got to the top. Upon reaching the top, I was absolutely elated to see a down slope. Not 5 minutes after reaching the top, Kathy from Socal Hikers & Peakbagger shows up out of nowhere. Well, not out of nowhere. I saw her and her friend at the bottom of the bowl while we were breaking halfway up. But still, I didn’t realize she was that close.

After getting to the top of the Bowl, there wasn’t anymore real high drama or excitement. Now it just becomes a matter of getting to the top. Which means a good workout. We trudged along as best we could but had to stop every 50 feet or so. Hiking in the snow isn’t exactly easy.

We finally reached the top at about 1pm. Funny thing about Baldy, it was nothing but ice. Anything other than crampons, and you would be slipping and a sliding.

The way down was pretty uneventful. Except for the SAR helo’s looking for some lost or possibly injured hikers. Turned out to be a false report though. Hopefully it was.

Here’s the gallery from the day. Pics taken by Tim, Kathy, and myself.

Lastly, as crazy as it sounds, I’m tempted to try the eastern route. I said I wouldn’t, but the excitement is just too much. Although this time, I think I’ll wait until conditions are better.

My photos here

Our initial plan was to take Register Ridge up to the Devil’s Backbone trail, continue on reaching Mt. Harwood, Mt. Baldy, Dawson, and Pine. However we knew there was going to be snow on the north face of Baldy so we weren’t sure about the latter two.

GPS track here

KML Google Earth file

Mt Baldy via Register Ridge at EveryTrail

I was also trying on a new pair of shoes. I ordered several pairs from Sierra Trading Post with the intention of trying them all and keeping one pair. Last week was the Salomon Solaris, which was good except for poor lateral support – an important feature on cross-country hikes like Rattlesnake Peak.

This week I was trying the Asolo Veloce. A nice looking pair with Vibram soles, but with stiff soles I wasn’t sure how well they would break in during the first hike.

Anyways, we were off a bit past 8am, and once hitting the Ski Hut trail, we quickly diverged onto the clearly worn Register Ridge use trail.

Of course, this is a steep path. But it is a good steep, the terrain for footing is reasonable. And I always enjoy hiking around fallen pine needles, as they pad the feet and smell nice.

Here is a video of some ridge ascent around an area with large boulders:

The view south of course gives clear views down the canyon. On this day, there were some interesting views due to cloud cover and light rays pouring through.

At this point, we reached the Devil’s Backbone Trail. We just scaled about 2700 ft in 1.5 miles up the ridge, and about 3000 ft in 2.5 miles total! We took a short break then headed up straight toward Mt Harwood.

However as we were approaching the backbone trail and then on to Harwood, it began hailing on us. And the weather around looked somewhat formidable, although clear skies were not too far away.

After bagging Harwood, we decided to mix it up just a bit and veer toward the northeast face of Baldy to ascend instead of the normal east route. This provided more of a workout dealing with the scree and scrambling.

We then ascended to some really cool views.

Once we had ascended Register Ridge, it was really, really windy. And initially there was no sun. Luckily the sun finally came out to provide some warmth and to counterbalance the wind.

We started heading down toward Dawson, but after a few hundred feet down found the entire face covered in snow up to 1 ft deep. The snow could be traversed in the current condition, but I wasn’t sure how it would act (freezing) later on the return so we decided to bail out on that portion of the trip. However, it might have been possible to avoid the snow if one stays as far west on the ridge as possible, as there was less to no snow there.

Instead, we hiked back up and over to West Baldy, and went down several hundred feet toward the San Antonio ridge. It looked really inviting, but that’s for another day.

So we turned around and traversed over toward the Ski Hut trail. We decided to check out those airplane crash sites.

I’ll assume someone put this here and it didn’t land this way!

We then descended traversed along the western side of the ridge until we hit the saddle where the Ski Hut trail veers down easterly. Instead we continued on the ridge for a while to check it out. After some descent, we traversed across the side of the ridge to meet back up with the Ski Hut trail.

We met up with the trail, and followed it back to the cars.

In the end, this was about a 10 mile, 5000 ft jaunt with major cross-country portions. While we didn’t get to Dawson & Pine, we saw some great views and had some great hiking.

KML Google Earth file

Mt. San Antonio (Baldy) via Ski Hut Trail & Devils Backbone Loop at EveryTrail

Map created by EveryTrail:GPS Geotagging