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Ascent of Josephine Peak on 2007-04-21

Climber: Mark Habermeyer

Date:

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Ascent Type:

Successful Summit Attained

Peak:

Josephine Peak

Location:

USA-California

Elevation:

5558 ft / 1694 m

Ascent Trip Report

What a wonderful hiking day in SoCal! After Friday's storm Jeph and I headed up to Clear Creek Ranger Station at the start of the Josephine Peak fire road. We got an early start at 8am and started up the road. Our first indication of snow was at 3,800 ft! (Just a few patches) The road became all snow around 4,500 ft. (Not much, maybe an inch or two) Reached the saddle after 4 bikers came whizzing down the road around 9am (I wonder what time they started?) Turned left at the saddle and hiked the road up. Incredibly there was absolutely NO WIND! The clouds were all puffy and cotton candy like. The bikers had turned around about 1/4 mile up so from that point on I was breaking trail! This was the first time that I ever hiked in the snow and it was a BLAST! (Although much more work!). Arrived at the summit at 10:30am and took a 1/2 hr. break.

The views were spectacular! We were the first one's to the top and had the summit all to ourselves. Ten minutes later 3 bikers came up with their bikes! WOW! That was a workout in the snow! Left the summit at 11:09am and hiked back down. We decided to try and attempt Strawberry Peak although I knew there was no direct trail to the top. Jeph got tired so I had him stop under a nice tree as I went solo from there. As you can see on the TOPO map I went out about 2miles and then straight up a creek bed to try for the summit. As the terrain got steeper and more slippery with the wet snow I decided to come back another day and try and tag Strawberry. I really need a GPS unit to navigate my way to the top. I should have stayed on top of the ridge to get there but oh well, the summit will be there another day! I calculated our mileage today at 12.5 so it was a great workout! Here is my trip log:

Josephine Fire Road- 8:01am
Josephine Saddle- 9:18am
Josephine Peak- 10:25am
leave summit- 11:09am
Josephine Saddle- 11:44am
Strawberry Peak Trail turn around point- 12:44pm
return to cars- 2:42pm

It was a wonderful day to hike in our local mountains!

Summary Total Data

Route Conditions:

Road Hike, Snow on Ground

Gear Used:

Ski Poles

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