A Hiking Blog for Southern California
About his controversial climb of Delicate Arch, it is still impressive to watch Dean Potter at work.
I stumbled upon this admittedly-old video of him ascending the Nose of El Capitan in 2006 via the wonder that is the Google Homepage. Makes for good Friday viewing while you’re waiting for 5 o’ clock to roll around …
This week, the California Assembly passed the attractively named Assembly Joint Resolution 21, which would ask Washington, D.C. to repeal the 2004 law that authorized entrance and use fees for federal land. The bill now moves to the California Senate. Similar resolutions have already passed in other Western states, like Idaho, Colorado, Montana, Oregon, and halfway through Alaska (still has to get ratified by Alaskan Senate).
John Karevoll, of the Western Slope No Fee Coalition, said:
If I drive my son to a basketball game at our high school and pull to the side of the road to check out the view, I can be ticketed, ultimately fined $5,000 or get six months jail. We’re not talking about a developed scenic turnout, just the side of State Highway 18. So the Adventure Pass is clearly a barrier, it keeps people away. I can tell you that forest visitation has dropped the past few years despite the Inland Empire’s growth. In fact, half the time I see nobody. Even on major holidays.
I think these guys are on the right side, but there’s more than a fair share of hyperbole in that statement. You’d have to catch a ranger on a very bad day to get a $5000 fine for pulling over on the side of the road. And these passes are by no means expensive. Here in the Angeles, Cleveland, or Los Padres National Forests, a day use pass will run you five bucks. If you’re caught without one, you even have the option to just pay the fiver by mail. Or you can also pick up an annual pass for $30 - which, if you go hiking about once a week like I do, works out to a bank-breaking 58 cents per trip.
At first, I wasn’t exactly sure what the ultimate aim of these measures was. To force the government’s hand to fund federal parks and recreation areas the way they’re supposed to? To bolster public interest and attendance in these areas? Or is it to stop the Forest Service from double-charging for access and collecting money instead of spending what it already has responsibly?
Scott at Wild Wilderness reposted an article originally appearing in Fly Rod & Reel magazine that tackles the issue with clarity and depth. They mention the original law was written by Enemy of the Environment Richard Pombo, and was designed to increase vehicular access to wilderness areas, gut the Forest Service of federal funds, and force privatization of the parks.
That wasn’t my first instinct when I read about this program, but given Pombo’s abysmal track record, it’s certainly well within the realm of possibility.
Either way, it’s definitely an issue worth keeping tabs on. Lucky for us, Wild Wilderness is doing a great job of posting lots of updates, information, and analysis on the Recreation Access Tax. Or, as it is now becoming known on the interweb - the RAT.
I like the ring of that.
L.A. Observed - an excellent blog on the state of newspaper journalism and other media here in the City of Angels - has a nice video covering a short tour of the L.A. River, courtesy of the Friends of the L.A. River.
It’s a six minute mini-history of the revitalization efforts, very well done and very interesting. Worth checking out - especially if you’re excited about one of the potential Next Great Civil Engineering Projects here in the US of A.
A post-storm trip on the Pacific Crest Trail to one of the ‘lower high’ peaks on the north range of the San Gabriels. A little bit of snow-hiking, some bouldering, and just a touch of backcountry navigation to round off the trip. A great trek to a lightly-traveled peak. The summit of Mount Pacifico has a beautiful campground, and is also accessible by fire road.
The smirking eco-punsters over at Grist have assembled an excellent ‘best of’ list for their extensive collection of excellent enviro-stories over the past year. And, for your convenience, they’re all organized into simple “Best” categories, like “Greenest Mayor” (Salt Lake City?!? Wow) and the “Depressingest Study in Science” (no seafood by mid-century).
And of course, this being Grist, they make time for jabs at those things worthy of them, such as:
Biggest beneficiary of the corn ethanol boom: Archer Daniels Midland
Second biggest: politicians in need of something green-sounding to say
Third: nope, just the two
And they offer up this photo as their “Amusingest Photo-Op:”
… which is sad, because the first time I saw it, I thought it was a Photoshop. Sigh.
Great reads abound over at Grist.
Anyone have any interesting Earth Day activities planned for this Sunday?
Southern California seems to have its fair share of events going on, from the usual festivals and coast clean-ups to an attempt at the World’s Largest Hug in Laguna Beach.
Earth Day LA has a comprehensive, city-by-city list of what’s going down, when and where, although I have a feeling I’ll be doing my own thing with a peaceful solo mountain hike.
Last year, I went down to San Diego’s EarthWorks in Balboa Park, which had a great mix of folk music and cutting-edge solar and home-grown electric automobile technologies on display.
If you end up going to a festival, just make sure you remember that this is about more than just drinking organic cold cider while you listen to a family bluegrass band and get warm fuzzies from picking up a pamphlet on solar heating. Whatever lifestyle changes you’re inspired to make have to happen year-round to make a difference. And they don’t even have to be drastic to have an impact (see, CFLs below).
Oh, and make sure you’ve got your patchouli tolerance beefed up.
Andrew Skurka is updating!
Or, more accurately for now, his mother is updating.
Still, it’s exciting to be able to read about a guy on a 6800+ mile hike through our Great Western States. And even more exciting to see that he plans to incorporate on-the-go podcasts and RSS picture feeds on his site, so I can feel worse about not being even close to thinking about approaching Skurka’s hiking aptitude.
Still, I’m all for tech on the trail.
I’ll keep you updated when the podcasts start rolling in. Until then, good luck to Andrew!
I was going through the ol’ blog-archives, and found an old trip to Icehouse Canyon. Since I’ve already written-up a few other trails that go through the canyon, I won’t give this the full treatment. This was written on my first time in the Canyon. It is now one of my all-time favorite hikes — an incredibly peaceful streambed canyon amid high-altitude mountains and forests. This is about as far from urban Los Angeles as you can feel without driving for six hours.
Continue reading ‘Hiking Icehouse Canyon’
Remember this coming Sunday is Earth Day. And remember, if you’re near a Home Depot store, to swing by and pick up one of the one million free compact fluorescent bulbs the chain is handing out as part of its Eco-Options Campaign.
Installing CFLs in your home or apartment is one of the easiest ways to ‘green-up’ your lifestyle. They last ten times as long as regular incandescent bulbs, can use up to 75% less energy, and work with your existing fixtures. The main problem people seem to have with them is they’re more expensive up-front than that old 19th Century technology, but now that the Depot’s giving ‘em away for free, you’ve got no excuse.
Home Depot estimates its Million Bulb Giveaway will result in $12 million in saved energy costs and eliminating 196 million pounds of CO2 - which is like removing 70,000 cars from American highways.
Awesome!
A short hike to one of Southern California’s classic hiking destinations. An easy route that can extend as far as you want, with great opportunities for climbing and a wonderful place to refresh your bouldering skills.
Click here for a Google Map of Los Angeles hiking trails.
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