Above the Crowd

On a sunny but brisk January day in the Santa Ana Mountains, Allyn Schneider of Irvine hiked along the fire road with Saddleback mountain over his shoulder.

Looking east, he could see snow-blanketed Mt. San Jacinto towering above the Hemet Valley. To the west, Newport Beach office buildings glistened in front of the haze-shrouded silhouette of Catalina island.

Schneider stepped gingerly through a thin crust of icy snow and smiled.

“You don’t get a chance,” he said, “to hike in snow very often in Orange County.”

For most, the Santa Ana Mountains are merely one-dimensional scenery, no more noticeable than background noise. But for those who get closer than the San Diego Freeway, who hike, bike, ride on horseback or even motor up, the slopes are full of rich details.

Although surrounded by a metropolitan area teeming with more than 20 million people, the Trabuco Ranger District of the Cleveland National Forest gets relatively low use. It’s one-quarter the size of Los Angeles County’s Angeles National Forest, but its 120 miles of remote trails attract only thousands--compared to Angeles’ 32 million annual visitors.

Most who enter the district’s boundaries are just passing through, driving by on Ortega Highway, a twisting two-lane road that is the main commuter route between the rapidly growing Temecula Valley and South Orange County.

“You have to get off on the dirt roads and the trails to appreciate the Santa Anas,” said Ken Croker, who wrote a trail guide to the mountains.

The view from the top--the twin peaks of 5,687-foot Santiago and 5,496-foot Modjeska--can be incredible. On clear days, a person standing on Santiago, the county’s highest point, looks down on thousands of square miles of land and seascape.

Laid out in all directions is the coastline from Point Loma in San Diego to Point Dume in Malibu, Catalina and San Clemente islands, the San Bernardino and San Gabriel mountains, and even flat-topped Table Mountain 100 miles south on the other side of the Mexican border.

Just don’t linger up there.

The summit is crowded with telecommunications antennae that relay electronic transmissions all over the Southland. Rangers say long-term exposure is dangerous. Put a raw egg next to a control box inside one of the low-slung communications buildings and they say it will be hard-boiled in a half hour.

But those hoping for a natural experience shouldn’t fret. Views from lower Santa Ana peaks and ridges can be nearly as spectacular and the canyons hold many lush treasures: Santiago Peak is the wettest spot in the county, averaging 35 inches of rain a year, nearly triple the average down below in Santa Ana.

Waterfalls plunge down deep ravines choked with sycamores, alders and massive old-growth oak trees. Delicate wildflowers blanket meadows in spring, below ridges and higher slopes that hold stands of pine trees. Visitors might catch a glimpse of deer, a bobcat, a coyote, even an occasional mountain lion.

The trails can be dusty and brutally hot in the summer, but during the other nine months the conditions are usually much more comfortable. And this time of year, there are few better places in the Southland to get away from crowds.

Croker, 65, has retired to the Sierra Nevada foothills near Yosemite, but for 24 years he spent nearly every other weekend in the Santa Anas, leading volunteer trail maintenance crews.

“In most cases,” Croker said, “the trails we rehabilitated and recovered were totally invisible.”

By the time he retired and moved away in 1997, Croker, an aerospace engineer, had helped clear nearly 100 miles of trails and written the comprehensive “Santa Ana Mountains Trail Guide,” which sold out four printings, introducing thousands to his favorite spots.

Croker can go on and on about the range that stretches 34 miles from the Santa Ana River canyon to Camp Pendleton.

“The person who is smart enough not to go out on a 100-degree day can have a pretty good time all year around,” he said. “The people I have taken out over the years are amazed by the beautiful canyons you can find.”

He marvels at the San Mateo Wilderness Area south of Ortega Highway, where wildflowers burst out in spring and hikers--cars and bicycles aren’t allowed in federal wilderness areas--can find swimming holes in San Mateo Creek.

There’s the 142-foot waterfall in Hot Spring Canyon north of Ortega Highway, reachable only by a grueling cross-county scramble up a poison oak-choked canyon.

“It’s definitely an ‘Oh, wow!’ type waterfall,” Croker said.

And then there’s Santiago Peak, a destination notable mainly for its view, Croker said. When it’s clear enough, you can see the curve of the earth on the Pacific Ocean horizon, a unique opportunity because of the peak’s 15-mile distance from the coast.

As long as people have lived in the area, they have been captivated by the mile-high mountain, which has been known by several different names.

The Juaneno Indians called it Kalawpa and believed it was inhabited by the deity who created their people.

To 18th century conquistadors, it was Trabuco, Spanish for blunderbuss, a shotgun-like weapon one of their soldiers lost in the mountains. Some called it Temescal or San Juan Mountain; two state geologists who made the second recorded ascent in 1861 named it Mt. Downey after the California governor of the time.

Surveyors officially dubbed it Santiago in the late 1800s and later named its sister peak after the Polish-American actress Helena Modjeska, who moved onto the mountain’s lower slopes in 1890.

However, Old Saddleback--now shortened to Saddleback--is the only name that really stuck.

That’s what it was called by homesteaders who settled in the surrounding canyons in the 19th century. They raised goats and bees and hunted for game: Deer and quail were abundant, according to “Shadows of Old Saddleback,” a book written in the 1930s by Terry Stephenson. They fended off California grizzlies--one of the last of the species was killed in Trabuco Canyon in 1908--mountain lions, bobcats and coyotes.

Silver was discovered in the area in 1877, a find that spawned the mining town Silverado, which supported seven saloons at the height of its five-year boom. Silver miners went up the slopes for the pine timber found at higher elevations and others ventured up to hunt.

The first recorded ascent was in 1854 by a posse on horseback chasing horse thieves. Next, in January 1861, state geologist Josiah Dwight Whitney and assistant William Brewer made it to the top on foot, struggling up steep slopes and tangled, thorny shrubs.

After six hours of climbing during the geological survey, Whitney, for whom California’s highest peak is named, and Brewer reached the top. They were scratched and bleeding, but awe-struck, according to Brewer’s journal account quoted in Stephenson’s book:

“A cold, piercing, raw wind fairly shrieked over the top. It was so cold I could hardly write the bearings as read off. But the view more than repaid us for all we had endured. It was one of the grandest I ever saw.”

The way up is easier these days. It’s considered a strenuous hike or bike--the elevation gain is about 4,000 feet on most routes. It’s even possible to drive up in a car or street-legal motorcycle on unpaved forest service roads, although motor access has been prohibited for the last month because of muddy road conditions from rain and snow.

In the best of conditions, driving up is a bumpy ride and the forest service recommends taking a four-wheel-drive vehicle.

Driving the fire roads leads to other problems, said Clem LaGrosa, the district’s head ranger. It’s prime ground for people seeking out-of-the-way areas to party. LaGrosa said unauthorized rave parties are common during warm months and there is quite a bit of underage drinking and drug use. Some drive motorcycles or all-terrain vehicles down single-track trails that are off-limits to motor vehicles.

In short, the district has the same problems found in any wilderness area near a city.

“It’s actually no different from what’s happening in the San Bernardino or Angeles forests,” LaGrosa said. “The activity is not as intense, but it’s getting there.”

Most users don’t cause problems and many actually help the small staff of forest service employees maintain and patrol the district.

Mountain bikers have taken over for hikers as the most dedicated trail maintenance volunteers, Behrens said.

“We are all for keeping it primitive, keeping it technical and that slows down speeds and provides people with the way-back-there experience,” said Chris Vargas, leader of the Warrior’s Society of the Santa Ana Mountains, a group of bikers who also hike. Park-goers are never very far from civilization, but all the usual rules of mountain safety apply.

Last June, a 19-year-old hiker fell 500 feet to his death while climbing on a rock face above Harding Creek. In September, two hikers wearing only shorts and tank tops spent the night huddled in Holy Jim Canyon after getting lost. They emerged in the morning cold and frustrated but unhurt.

Rangers recommend that visitors stay on marked trails, dress warmly in layers and bring the 10 essential survival items--map, compass, flashlight, extra food and water, extra clothing, hat, pocket knife, fire starter, first-aid kit and waterproof matches--and keep in mind that for every 1,000 feet of elevation gained the temperature drops about five degrees in dry weather and 3 1/2 in wet weather.

Schneider said he never hits the trails without the essentials. His warm clothes came in handy in March two years ago, when he and several friends were hiking up Modjeska and snow started falling.

“It was like walking in a winter wonderland,” Schneider said, “which you really don’t expect too often around here.”