SADDLE SOAR : Hiking to County’s 2 Highest Summits Are Peak, Albeit : Painful, Experiences

There are at least two ways to get into every saddle, and getting up Old Saddleback--the popular name for the two highest peaks in Orange County and the saddle formed between them--is no exception.

The peaks are Santiago, the highest at 5,687 feet, and Modjeska, at 5,496. The first time up Santiago Peak, we started from the terminus of Silverado Canyon Road, hit Modjeska first and then continued along the saddle to Santiago. That longish route took a friend and me 20 or so miles. In so doing, we discovered a new way of walking, which we dubbed “the rotational waddle.”

Two months later, joined by a third friend, we approached Santiago again, but this time from Trabuco Canyon via Holy Jim Falls.

The first trip focused on fortitude, the second on flora and fauna. Both were epics in their own way.

For the flora and fauna jaunt up the Holy Jim Trail, the sun dramatically backlit Old Saddleback as I left my house in Costa Mesa to meet friends for the hike up one of the most popular trails in Orange County.

Jerry Schad’s Afoot and Afield in Orange County gives the 15-mile hike to the top of Santiago and back its most difficult rating--”strenuous: full day’s hike over a long route.” It refers to the drive up Trabuco Creek Road to the trail head as an experience in itself, with rocks and potholes the norm.

Heavy rains had rendered the dirt road impassable for us in February, forcing the earlier approach from Silverado Canyon. This time, we could intimately experience the 4.7 miles of rocks and potholes, as well as stream crossings, in my two-wheel drive vehicle.

We reached the parking area just past the Holy Jim Fire Department at 8:30 a.m. and headed up the east bank of the stream past a tiny community of cabins.

A sign at the trail head proclaimed, “You are entering a trail characterized by certain inherent dangers, including mountain lions, rattlesnakes, poison oak and rugged terrain. Mountain lions have recently been sighted.”

Ladders had been thoughtfully provided at two stream crossings. After a half dozen crossings, and at a distinctive split rock, the trail veered up to the right. We went left across the stream and several hundred yards along the canyon bottom until we reached the gently cascading Holy Jim Falls.

Had it been any later in the day, a dip in the idyllic shallow pool under the falls would have been perfect. It was easy to see why the three-mile hike to the falls is so popular.

According to Schad’s book, the trail and falls are named for a beekeeper--James T. Smith--who lived in the canyon a century ago and whose cursing habit earned him the nickname Cussin’ Jim. Genteel government map makers, however, re-christened Jim Holy.

One of my two hiking companions, William Johnson, had indeed spotted beehives along Trabuco Canyon. Somewhat in keeping with the bee theme, William also spotted a yellow and black bird and a yellow and black butterfly not far from the falls.

Yellow and purple flowers, and towering oaks, were plentiful as we continued up from the canyon bed, but the trail quickly metamorphosed from Holy Jim heaven to chaparral hell.

“These are called the itchy scratchy plants,” said Brian Johnson, no relation.

The sound of paws flattening brush recalled the warning sign at the trail head, and we were relieved moments later to also hear the jangle of a dog collar. A huge owl flew out just in front of us with a great commotion. I sat to rest in a patch of shade; not quite comfortable, I moved over two feet, not realizing till the last possible moment that I was about to sit on a small snake.

“Baby diamondback,” Brian said. “Those things don’t know when to stop releasing venom.”

“More potent, too,” William noted.

No matter that the species that properly goes by the name diamondback is not found in Orange County. I took their word for the rest.

We crossed several scree slides and a field dotted with century plants in bloom, then entered a peaceful grove of sycamores, maples and firs. At the end of the Holy Jim Trail, we turned onto the Main Divide Road.

The insects high up were obviously happy for the company. We ate our snacks like three huddled Bedouins, using extra clothes to form tents over our heads. The term final assault referred to both the push to the summit and the bugs.

“No wonder Holy Jim was cussing,” said William, who let loose his own string of expletives.

We pressed on, and the summit was a scene from a ‘50s space movie, spangled with antennas no doubt intended to track aliens. Santiago Peak is famous for its 360-degree unobstructed views of Catalina, the skyscrapers of downtown Los Angeles, the San Bernardino Mountains and the ranges along the Mexican border.

We saw bugs.

Repeater station workers wore netting around their heads, and one worker kindly cut us three swaths. With respite thus miraculously provided, we sat in the shade to eat lunch and recoup our energies. We started down the hill at 2:30 looking like Huey, Dewey and Louie in bee nets.

But the insects let up as we descended. By 4 p.m., we were talking baseball, and by 6 p.m., we were back in the parking lot.

*

Eight weeks earlier to the day, Old Saddleback seemed more imposing than usual, its mist-shrouded summit invoking one of those filmic lands where tyrannosauruses spend their days plucking pterodactyls from the skies.

Turned back by high water levels along Trabuco Canyon, Brian and I circled around to Silverado Canyon, where the Modjeska loop was estimated to be 18 miles round trip. As the crow flies, Santiago Peak would lie an additional mile to the southeast. We began the hike up Maple Springs Road at 10:30 a.m.

Jagged asphalt from the washed-out road created countless miniature waterfalls. We removed shoes and socks to ford the streams, which were not only far higher but far colder in winter. High above the canyon floor, rains had uprooted and strewn a hodgepodge of trees about the slopes; charred and gnarled trunks still standing recalled the 1987 Silverado fire.

The day continued to take on cinematic proportions. A military issue helicopter swooping over a ridge just before us seemed right out of “Apocalypse Now.” As the hike wore on, banter that wouldn’t have been out of place in “My Dinner With Andre” degenerated into Brian’s repeatedly quoting the old dog in “Homeward Bound”: “It’s just over the next ridge.”

At Modjeska Peak, we turned off onto what we had hoped was the Main Divide Road, and were immediately socked in by fog. We were now heading toward the thin sheath of ridge that forms the saddle of Ol’ Saddleback.

While Santiago theoretically lies a mere mile beyond Modjeska, we weren’t flying like crows, it was 3:30 p.m., and the endless switchbacks up the higher summit of Saddleback were becoming very Ol’. Snow now lined the road. I knew we were in trouble when I befuddledly observed that “the steep is becoming grader.” But finally, we had gained the supreme vantage of the highest point in Orange County.

We saw fog.

Our clothes had become seriously inadequate. So in consideration of the approaching darkness, and infringement on any climbers’ code notwithstanding, we accepted a ride to Modjeska from the last station worker leaving the mountain.

We then began our descent in earnest.

We had read in our field guide that Lost Woman Canyon lay midway down the final stretch of the descent.

“When the wind whistles down this canyon,” so the old-timers say, “it evokes the plaintive sounds of a woman calling for help. . . . Mildly hallucinating after many long miles, you may hear her.” We heard her loud and clear long before we reached the canyon.

We made a dozen stream crossings in the dark, and our limbs stiffened at the exponentially more frequent rest stops. We progressed to the aforementioned rotational waddle, which made as much use of our arms as our legs. But soon we could see the parking lot. “OK, we’re men now, so walk normal,” Brian said.

A week later, the waddle was but a memory, albeit a fond one. We knew we’d be making a, um, beeline back to the Holy Jim Trail in the spring. And though we didn’t see skyscrapers that time either, we knew that one of these times we would.