This was a good hike, overall I felt the trail was fairly easy until the last ½ mile to the summit where it became much steeper and the trail was more narrow. In some places, it was hard to tell that it was actually a trail and not just a wash or runoff area. The views from the summit were awesome though and worth the final scramble up.
I started late (1415) so anticipated doing some of the return in the dark, fortunately, the trail to 4 corners was really very easy to walk and I took it at a good pace. Given some reports I read and comments by other hikers I met at the trailhead, I was anticipating this to be a challenging trip where it could be easy to get off track. The good news was the little white trail markers were easy to find and follow.
There weren't many people out, I only passed 3 people as they headed back to the trailhead, and they could have been hiking different trails. The wind picked up while I was on the summit and rain showers started intermittently, so it was a quick trip back to stay ahead of the rain. I needed my lights for the last mile and a half. Poles were a definite plus on the ½ mile up and down from the summit, I don't like to think how much more difficult it would have been without them.
This was my first peak where I found one of the cool summit signs that people leave at the top 🙂 It makes me think I need to make a few for the summits where I haven't seen them and bring them the next time I do those hikes.
This was #5 on my 6POP, Sunday I will be going after Hot Springs Mt to make my first 6 before the end of February. I had hoped to complete all 6 San Diego hikes first, but with the summit at Cuyamaca being temporarily closed, I'll have to wait until that's open to round out the SD6.
As a side note, I ran multiple apps to track my route and performance. I was surprised by the difference in mileage and elevation gain reported by the Gaia GPS App and the All Trails App, while all the time-related points were spot on (moving time, average speed, total elapsed time) I don't understand why the mileage and elevation would be different, clearly, they have their own algorithms, but they should all work off the GPS data from my phone. I did run MapMyWalk too, but unfortunately, I forgot to shut it off at the end so the data wasn't useful for comparison. I'll run all three again on Sunday and see how each measures up. I haven't begun to research into the different apps and how they do what they do, I just hope to figure out which is the most accurate 🙂
Responses
Great work, Dale!
Was planning to hit Sitton tomorrow but with the rain looking to see any information you can provide on how the trail conditions may be? I have poles and would plan to start early heading out in the dark. Any info you can provide would be appreciated!
Thanks, Ryan. As you can see from the images I posted of my stats, the whole hike took me about 4 hours 15 minutes and that was with about 30 minutes stopped (mostly at the peak to take pictures and have a snack). Granted I did hustle on the trail as I was by myself and I knew some of my trip back would be in the dark. Unless you have a need to be back early, you don’t really have to get underway in the dark. Looking at the weather, the early morning rain slowly diminishes to about a 30% chance at 5 am, after that there’s no more rain for tomorrow, it is supposed to be cloudy and mid to upper 50’s. I don’t think the little rain we had today would have done too much to the trail, definitely use your poles for that last bit, but the first few miles should be in relatively good shape, maybe a little muddy, but I can’t think it would be too bad. Have a good hike! We’ll be tackling Hot Springs Mountain in the morning 🙂