Escort Required

Driving out hwy 243 in Hemet we ran into a portion of closed road. We waited 20 mins for the first escort at 0400. The escort section was 5-10 miles long. We were through the escort before Idylwyld. We were still making good time despite the road closure. We started to hike at 0515 and reached Little Round valley at 0900. We only saw a handful of people who passed us (everybody passes us) hiking up. It was a  beautiful day, cool and sunny. San Jacinto is really a pretty mountain. I always have this idea in my head that its a desert mountain. Couldn’t be more wrong. Anyway, we took the time to look around Little Round Valley and there are some really cool sites there. It was empty from Friday night. We saw one tent . But, while we were hiking down we saw a bunch of people heading up with overnight packs. I imagine Little Round Valley was going to be more populated Saturday night. When we got ot the cabin we dropped our packs and scrambled to the peak. The top was pretty busy. Lots of folks from the tram. We always talk about taking the tram but it’s just not as challenging. Oh ya, the bugs were somewhere between  “….weren’t too bad”  and  “…an annoyance” depending on were in the hike you were.