Brown Mountain & The Ken Burton Trail
A Saturday Adventure
7-15-2006
 
 
Saturday's mountain bike ride in the San Gabriel Mountains turned out to be more of a mountain bike adventure.  Prevailing wisdom was that the ongoing HEAT wave was going to be our biggest challenge of the day.  But lo' and behold (what does that mean), little did we know the varied challenges and excitement that awaited us five RCYers who headed up to Brown Mountain.
 
Matthew and John and Reuben and Dean and I began our pedal towards the Brown Mountain Fireroad just a few minutes after the 7:45 a.m. meeting time, hoping to get in as much climbing as possible before the heat of the day set in.
 
 
 
It was warm as we began to climb, but surprisingly much of the twisting fireroad up Brown Mountain had a southwest exposure, thus enabling us to pedal mostly in the shade, away from the sun rising in the east.  This ended up being an ideal climb for a hot day.  We saw quite a few hikers, runners, and other bikers enjoying this fireroad in the early morning.
 
Reuben and Dean pedal up Brown Mountain Fireroad in the shade
 
From Brown Mountain Fireroad: Angeles Crest Highway and the Verdugo Mountains in the distance
 
After almost 7 miles we arrived at the top of Brown Mountain....and the upper trailhead of the Ken Burton Trail.
 
 
Reuben, chesty Dean, Matthew and an apple-stuffed John pose at the entrance to the Ken Burton Singletrack
 
The view from the top looking back to our climb up Brown Mountain Fireroad
 
The Ken Burton Trail proved to be quite a challenge.  The trail had not had any maintenance in quite some time and so was quite overgrown.  The heavy brush and grasses made passage difficult in some areas, especially where the narrow trail was exposed to steep drop-offs.  One worried whether the trail tread was solid under the grasses or whether your handlebar would be caught by a passing branch and rider and bike might go hurtling over the edge.  Dean toppled over at one narrow section and went partially down a hillside.  We all ended up with bloody scratches from the brush and branches.  We walked many of the switchbacks, fearing imminent death if we erred even slightly.  The end of the trail was washed out and we had to walk to reach the bottom.  Otherwise, it was a fun and exciting ride.
 
Heavy growth covers the Ken Burton Trail
 
Reuben at the bottom of the Ken Burton Trail
 
Dean getting ready to follow Reuben across the rocky creek bed at the bottom of the Ken Burton Trail
 
At the bottom of the Ken Burton Trail we intersected with the Gabriellino Trail that comes down from the Red Box Ranger Station.  Our next challenge was the many crossings of the river/creek that we had to make as we made our way down the canyon towards our cars.  We could ride a few of the crossings but most were unrideable and we had to do alot of hike-a-bike.
 
Matthew and John on the other side of the creek that we had to cross many times as we worked our way back to the cars
 
A small (about 1 inch long) frog camouflaged on a rock
 
John attempted to ride this crossing twice, but finally had to walk the last part
 
As you can see from the last photo, we did alot of "walking in water".  But at one point as we worked our way down the trail we found ourselves in a wild berry patch.  The trail split at this point and we chose to go thru the patch in spite of the fact that we got more scratches from the thorny bushes.  Eventually we realized that we had taken the wrong route when we hit a "dead end" at the top of a very high man-made concrete dam.  To try and find the missed trail we turned around to retrace our steps, but decided that rather than go back thru the berry patch we would follow the river....the Amazon River, I think.
 
Fording the Amazon, Matthew finds a unique bike rack while Reuben and Dean tote theirs
 
After our venture wading upstream, we finally found the missed trail.  But I then realized that I had lost the prescription insert to my sunglasses....somewhere in the river.  So I went back to look and Matthew and Dean came back to help me.  After about 10 or 15 minutes of searching I was about to give up when Dean discovered the lenses at the base of a rock in the shallow bottom of the river right near the trail crossing.
 
Dean displays his miraculous find (I enhanced the outline of the inserts)....Thanx, Deano!
 
From here we had to climb some switchbacks that went up the side of the hill skirting the dam.  More downhill singletrack finally gave way to a wider road that took us back to our starting point near JPL....with over 15 miles of tough riding (and hiking and wading).  John had to head for home, but Matthew, Dean, Reuben and I headed over to the Hill Street Cafe in La Canada for some well earned eats and drinks to end an adventure-filled day in the San Gabriel Mountains.
 
Robco Baggins
 

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