Tweet
Gave Roger a call late Friday to see if he wanted to putt around the back side of the San Bernadino Mts Saturday where it would be a bit cooler than Calico. Turns out he was wanting to get out and I called at the right time. Met up at Rogers house in Lucerne and we took off up the hill to explore his "backyard". We meandered towards White Mountain noticing quite a few heavily vegetated green spots along the slope. Roger told me that there was a fault that ran along the back side of the mountains here and there were a lot of springs along the fault.
We drove through several, but there wasn't any noticeable water in most. Started seeing the remains of dwellings along this level and stopped at the first one. Not much left except a slab, fireplace refrigerator and the bones of mattresses.
Looking towards Lucerne from here we could see a hill with more ruins. We decided to go over and see what it was:
The sizable house was burned down, all that was left was the stuff that didn't burn. A nice bobtail truck that was parked head on to the house had it's front end burnt out. Was this place caught in one of the fires that swept through here in the past or ???
A very interesting water storage tank, this was the second one like it. There was another just like it up the hill a half mile at another site.
The ruins spread around this area all had a common feature, they had pipelines running up to the springs that you can see in the background. Did earthquakes in the recent past cause the water flow to stop, drought??? Very curious.
We continued up the trail along the backside of White mountain. It didn't appear to be used much. Up on the shelf trail there were quite a few big rocks and trees in the middle of the trail that posed a bit of a challenge. Roger was able to squeak by most of them, but my JK is significantly fatter and I had to go over several of the obstacles and add to the scars underneath.
We got up to 7000' and could see the top of the ridge into Holcomb valley. So near but so far, the trail ended 750' below the ridge. The view from up there of course were stunning.
On the way out we drove through some spring areas that were heavily brushed over, couldn't see the trail in spot it was so heavy. The trees were in heavy bloom and spectacular.
Final ruin on the way out and looking down on the mine haul rode, the asphalt siding was pretty old.
Thanks for showing me your backyard Roger!
Mike
We drove through several, but there wasn't any noticeable water in most. Started seeing the remains of dwellings along this level and stopped at the first one. Not much left except a slab, fireplace refrigerator and the bones of mattresses.
Looking towards Lucerne from here we could see a hill with more ruins. We decided to go over and see what it was:
The sizable house was burned down, all that was left was the stuff that didn't burn. A nice bobtail truck that was parked head on to the house had it's front end burnt out. Was this place caught in one of the fires that swept through here in the past or ???
A very interesting water storage tank, this was the second one like it. There was another just like it up the hill a half mile at another site.
The ruins spread around this area all had a common feature, they had pipelines running up to the springs that you can see in the background. Did earthquakes in the recent past cause the water flow to stop, drought??? Very curious.
We continued up the trail along the backside of White mountain. It didn't appear to be used much. Up on the shelf trail there were quite a few big rocks and trees in the middle of the trail that posed a bit of a challenge. Roger was able to squeak by most of them, but my JK is significantly fatter and I had to go over several of the obstacles and add to the scars underneath.
We got up to 7000' and could see the top of the ridge into Holcomb valley. So near but so far, the trail ended 750' below the ridge. The view from up there of course were stunning.
On the way out we drove through some spring areas that were heavily brushed over, couldn't see the trail in spot it was so heavy. The trees were in heavy bloom and spectacular.
Final ruin on the way out and looking down on the mine haul rode, the asphalt siding was pretty old.
Thanks for showing me your backyard Roger!
Mike
Attached Files
Comment