A Morning Hike In Pico Canyon

I love Pico Canyon. It has so much history. The old oil town of Mentryville, CA is there and there is old oil machinery and a historical sight there. Hiker and I took our neighbor Jean on a 5 mile hike there today. She had never been there before.

You park in the lot next to what is left of Mentryville and head up the canyon on a paved fire road. There is a pretty little side trail that goes up into a little canyon with a small creek, a lot of greenery and an oak grove. When we have a good wildflower season, this little canyon is full of blue lupines.

We then headed back to the main trail and headed farther up into Pico Canyon. At one point there is a spot where the old oil workers had an outdoor "casino". There are still card tables there and a frame for a roulette table. There is also an old wooden oil derrick there.

We continued on and came upon some old oil machinery the reached the historic sight of the first commercial oil well in the state of California. It is marked by a couple of plaques that tell the history of the well.

Here you can see the capped off well.

We went a little farther past the sight because I wanted to show Jean the Santa Susana Thrust Zone. Then we headed back down to the car and headed home.

In the photo below, you can see the twisted rock of the earthquake fault in the thrust zone.

A Bit Chilly, But Still A Great Hike

It was so beautiful outside this afternoon. I put Hiker in the car and we headed over to Placerita Nature Center. Even it was a little chilly outside it was warm in the sunny areas.

We headed across the parking lot and through the field, then walked through the Oak Grove picnic area and headed for the Canyon Trail.

As we entered the canyon, it became much colder as the sun could not reach down into the bottom.

When we got to the 1 mile marker along the trail, we stopped to rest for a few minutes and enjoy the view.

Headed back down the trail and back to the parking lot. A nice 2.7 mile hike.

Photo Op Hike

Last week we had about 2 or 3 days of really beautiful weather. Clear, blue sky and sunshine. It was chilly in the morning, but the afternoons were spectacular. My dog Hiker and I just had to get out into nature and take advantage of this weather. Hiker loves to explore Vasquez Rocks and I love to take photographs there, so off we went to Agua Dulce, CA on Thursday, January 3rd.

We explored the trails near the entrance to of the park first and then headed down the Pacific Rim Trail toward the main part of the park.

I love this county park because it gives you the feeling of being on another plant with all of the strange rock formations.

Spent over an hour there and hiked a little over 2 miles.