2004 Pinnacles Trip - Day 4
(Sunday, 21 March, 2004)
See also my photo gallery from this
day.
We woke up early on Sunday, rising at 6, and whipped up a simple breakfast of
coffee, bagels, cream cheese and lox. We drove up the road, arriving at the
Chalone parking lot at 7:45. We'd wanted to get an early start since this
trailhead has limited parking, and typical of when we get up early to avoid
crowds, we were the only car there :).
Hiking out at 7:50, on the Old Pinnacles Trail, an old double-track road built by the CCC in
the 1930s following Chalone Creek. The fog that had been hanging over us
burned off very quickly, and we were treated to a lovely display of
wildflowers, starting with lupine,
mission bells,
fiddleneck,
california
manroot,
shooting stars and buttercups. Other than a solitary
stink beetle, there was no wildlife to
be seen. There were numerous crossing of Chalone Creek, making this a
poor choice for wet-season hiking unless you bring hip waders! The trail was
"under destruction" in some places to return Chalone Creek's floodplain to a
more natural state (the CCC trail bisected the creek and its floodplain).
This was nice, as the rerouting was on a verdant green hillside. The
first mile or so passed quickly, and after 8 (count 'em) creek crossings, we
veered right on the Balconies Cliff Trail.
The little bit of climbing that followed normally wouldn't have fazed us at
all, but the two prior days of long'ish and steep'ish hikes left our legs a
touch unenergetic. We soon got our first views of the namesake Balconies
Cliffs, and they were just beautiful! Larkspur, Fremont's Star Lily,
Redstem Filaree,
Blue Fiestaflower,
Douglas
Wallflower and
Bladder
Parsnip abounded.
The cliffs towered above us, deeply eroded and somewhat orange-tinged, with
long views down the Chalone Creek
valley we'd just hiked up.
Various birds flitted in and out, but none closely enough that we could
identify them.
We descended to the head of the Balconies Caves Trail, arriving at 9:30.
There were large patches of sedum covering many of the rocks here in the
deeply-shadowed valley. We soon entered the caves (talus jumbles, like the
Bear Gulch Cave of the previous day) and had a great time clambering around.
I acutally liked this cave better than Bear Gulch, but that was probably
largely due to an almost complete absence of people.
Exiting the cave, we returned the way we came along Chalone Creek. We saw
more people now, some obviously coming from our trailhead, some coming from an
extended High Peaks Loop. We saw Sarah Orange Tip and Sonoran Blue
butterflies on the walk back, but overall I was surprised by how little
wildlife we saw here since it is an isolated hike, and near a water source. We got back to the car at 10:45, making this a
fairly short, but positively beautiful hike.
Back at camp, we broke everything down, packed the car, and drove homeward.
We'd heard of a terrific tamale parlor in Hollister, but we arrived to find it
closed until 4pm, so we had to settle for Panda Garden "chinese" food in
Morgan Hill - yecch.
This was a terrific hike, and the wildflowers were well-varied. It can be
done much more quickly if you park at the west entrance of Pinnacles (recall
that there are no roads connecting the east and west entrances, and it is a
loooong drive between them!), but this would bypass the lovely stroll along
Chalone Creek.
Day's statistics:
| Distance: |
5.5mi |
| Time: |
2hrs 51min |
| Elevation gain: |
~400' |
| Difficulty: |
4 |
| Scenery: |
9 - superb! |
| Trail condition/markings/etc: |
10 |
| Overall rating: |
9.5 |
Trip links:
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