Life at the Top: Snow Lures Hundreds of Revelers to Mt. Pinos

At Mt. Pinos on the northeast tip of Ventura County, the clouds were a steely gray and temperatures hovered in the 30s Sunday.

But the wintry weather didn’t stop hundreds of fun seekers from frolicking in the snow at the recreation area, one of the most popular winter playgrounds in Southern California because of its proximity to the major cities of Ventura, Los Angeles and Kern counties.

Karen Walters, 30, of Long Beach was pulling what appeared to be a pile of blankets on a small metal toboggan. Under the woolen fluff was her 2-year-old daughter, Jessica.

“We’ve been coming up here since we were kids, and now we’re bringing our children back here,” she said. “Back then, we used to come up here in tennis shoes.”

About 400 cars were in the lot that dead-ends at the base of ski trails leading to the summit of the mountain. But U. S. Forest Service Ranger Martin Hinz, who supervises the Mt. Pinos area, characterized the turnout as relatively low. A heavy day, he said, can draw 1,500 cars to the lot and force rangers and the California Highway Patrol to close off the often icy road, requiring visitors to park a couple of miles away.

On Sunday, visitors found a number of ways to take advantage of three feet of packed snow.

Adults and children whizzed down the snowy slopes on toboggans, sleds and even old inner tubes. Every so often, an “Oh, no!” could be heard as a sled careened into a tree or hit a bump in the snow and tossed its occupants into a snowbank.

Nearby, Crystal Santana, 12, of Los Angeles lay in her parents’ van nursing a cut left leg after a sledding accident. “I couldn’t jump out of my sled fast enough,” she said.

Beth Olson of Granada Hills; her daughter, Melissa, 10, and their dog Nikki, a malamute, were returning from a meadow where they spent the day playing in the crunchy snow. She said they avoided snow-related injuries because “we know what we’re doing.”

Rangers said some people come unequipped for cold weather.

“It’s not unusual to see a woman step out with high heels on or to see a front-wheel-drive car with chains on the rear wheels,” said the bearded Hinz, 43, a supervising ranger who has spent 17 years patrolling the wilderness atop the highest ground in Los Padres National Forest.

Cash Murphy, 43, a member of the National Ski Patrol rescue unit, surveyed a parking area at the 8,300-foot level, just 531 feet beneath the mountain summit. One problem, he said, is that visitors are “so close to the city that people forget they can get into trouble up here.”

Part of the responsibility of the patrol is to sweep the mountain at the end of each day to make sure that skiers and hikers return to their cars. Murphy pointed to menacing dark clouds to the north, indicating that a storm would soon be moving into the area.

“We’ll get snow at 6 p.m.,” Murphy said in a confident voice.

The storm clouds Murphy spotted were spawned in the Gulf of Alaska. They were moving in on the heels of another storm that produced moist tropical air from Hawaii. The result will be rain, heavy at times, through much of the week, according to WeatherData Inc., which provides forecasts to The Times.

“There will be one quick wave after another of rain while the storm system remains stationary in the Pacific Northwest,” meteorologist Steve Burback said. “It could provide the longest period of rain since last March, and could amount to quite a bit.”

Burback forecast that the snow level in the mountains would drop to between 4,000 feet and 5,000 feet. Meanwhile, temperatures in Ventura County will be in the 50s and 60s during the day, dropping to the 30s and 40s at night.

But Sunday’s cold temperatures didn’t stop people from coming to Mt. Pinos.

A Long Beach church group of some two dozen adults and children picnicked in the snow with a vat of hot chocolate that sent steam into the winter air, and with garlic bread warming on a fire and filling the air with a delicious scent.

Still, nothing’s perfect. “My feet are cold,” said Cheryl Walters, 28.

Across the meadow, Bob Manning, a contractor from nearby Pine Mountain, was cross-country skiing with his wife, Debra, who managed to carry their 2 1/2-year-old child with her.

“The big problem is people coming up here and crashing into each other,” Bob Manning said.

Millie Cohn, 46, of Los Angeles huddled in a green sweat shirt reading in her station wagon while a heater kept her warm. Outside, her family played in the snow.

“I knew exactly how cold it would be; that’s why I’m staying in the car and not coming out,” she said. “I’ll eat and read and watch from the car.”