"Code Words"

6-May 2022: It was already further than I had to go for the difficult Buckhorn Falls scramble that I also did last month.

As I continued the rough boulder scrambling with plenty more spots of bushwhacking through overgrowth, I especially had to pay attention to more sections with fallen leaves concealing loose soil or even gaps!

In fact, I had flashbacks of the slow going jungle hiking that I had to do in Puerto Rico where I tried to make sure I wasn’t stepping on wet rocks or rocks that were just too slippery to stay upright.

However, in this case, I actually looked for rocks since I sensed they were better for footing (unless the rocks were loose).

There were also a few fallen trees that I had to duck under (making me even more concerned about a tick jumping down onto me like one must have done at Etiwanda Falls early last year…

It was 4:30am when I awoke, which was pretty much like another workday for me except this time I was targeting the Allison Gulch Falls, which I had been thinking about ever since visiting the Bridge to Nowhere last month.

So I did the usual routine of having my kefir breakfast while making sure that I had the gear that I expected to use for this upcoming challenging hike and scramble.

I ended up loading the car with my trusty day pack, waterproof hiking socks, the Altra Lone Peak 5 (since I know I’m going through water a lot), 2x trekking poles (just in case), and 2x 40oz stainless steel water bottles.

Eventually, I started driving off at 6:05am, which was under some overcast skies, which I suspected was from an overnight marine layer.

But as I got closer to the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains at the Azusa Ave exit, the marine layer was starting to burn off and reveal the typically cloudless Southern California weather that we often take for granted.

The traffic was fairly light throughout so I presumed that I must have beaten the worst of the rush hour commute, and eventually by about 7:05am, I made it to the familiar East Fork Trailhead.

Even though Cinco de Mayo was yesterday, on this morning, there were still only a handful of cars (though I’d imagine tomorrow will be a zoo here).

After donning the gear and putting on the trail runners with waterproof socks, I was then on my way at 7:20am.

Ahead of me was one solo hiker while there was another (rather rowdy) carload of dudes making some kind of raucous that I couldn’t tell what it was about since I was well down the trail at that point.

Anyways, since I was hiking alone, I was going at a pretty good pace as I got past the familiar Heaton Flat and ultimately to the first legitimate stream crossing at around 7:40am.

Note that I didn’t count the first interlude, where I only had to keep right along the river as the water itself was diminishing and keeping more to the left (so it was possible to stay mostly dry on that first “interlude”).

Nevertheless, learning from the first two times on this trail earlier this year, I now crossed the river and stuck to the left to get onto a easier ledge trail on the west side of the San Gabriel River.

Looking across the river, I could see the paths of where we used to have gone, but after learning about this ledge trail at the end of the day on our second visit, I knew that to remain efficient, this ledge trail was the way to go.

Eventually at about 7:50am, I made it past the “graffiti wall” were I crossed the river and went past another ruin or relic at the very start of the long dry interlude through yucca patches and some mild boulder scrambles (especiallly at rock fall areas).

So I managed to breeze through this area as I was making good time and I was pretty much still in the morning shade so I never really got that sweaty.

By about 8:20am, I made it to the familiar sign for the Sheep Mountain Wilderness across the Laurel Gulch.

Then, by about 8:35am, I went across the zig-zag river crossing before the Swan Rock and made it up to the mouth of Allison Gulch, where I then left the East Fork Trail to go into the Allison Gulch itself.

I was thinking at this point that the progress was so quick and efficient that I might entertain the thought of extending this scramble and making my way up to the Bridge to Nowhere.

And to do all that before heading home in time for an early Mother’s Day dinner at my parents.

However, I started to realize that this scramble was going to be a bit harder than I anticipated because it didn’t take long before the “trail” started to disappear and it was pretty much a stream scramble the rest of the way.

By about 8:45am, which was right when I pretty much lost the trail and was about to scramble up past some bouldery cascade, that was when I applied DEET on myself in the hopes of deterring any tick that might want to latch onto me.

Continuing on with the scramble, it started to get a bit uncomfortable and rough pretty quickly as I found myself doing a combination of bouldering and bushwhacking.

It seemed like half the time, the scrambling was done while there was no water in Allison Gulch (though I knew that the water was beneath loose soil or boulders).

Then, there were other times when I could hear Allison Gulch running above the surface over small cascades while revealing some stagnant pools with some water bugs in them.

At around 9:15am, I managed to slowly make my way towards some kind of random looking mining relic, which reminded me that there used to be a trail this way leading towards the Allison Mine.

I was well aware that the mine was difficult to reach, and I really had no intention of going there as I only targeted the waterfall.

Nevertheless, I was curious to see if there was a trail or some semblance of it, especially since I couldn’t seem to find any trail anymore within the gulch itself.

The whole time I was doing this scramble, I was looking to see if there were signs of people who might have followed or blazed a trail in the past.

However, even if I did find what looked to be a trail (which was probably more like a game trail or something), it didn’t take long before it disappeared into overgrowth and fallen trees.

And so I resigned myself to the fact that I was pretty much on my own in this adventure, and now it was a matter of figuring out just how far I had to endure these rough conditions before finally reaching the Allison Gulch Falls.

Heh, I recalled someone telling us on our Instagram page that Allison Gulch was “fun”.

I’ve come to realize that the word was really code for “difficult”.

By about 9:25am I had to change out my GoPro batteries, and so my original thinking that I might make it to the waterfall before having to switch the batteries was a total underestimate.

In fact, I wasn’t really sure how much more of this scrambling that I would have to endure as my thoughts were now turning towards how it took me around an hour in each direction to scramble to Buckhorn Falls a few weeks ago.

By about 9:55am, I reached a spot where I saw quite a bit of litter, which was definitely out-of-place considering how much effort it took to get here.

At this spot, I saw that there was a major overgrown area where I either had to plow right through uncomfortably or find another way to continue along the Allison Gulch.

I opted to choose the latter where I crossed the stream and found some dicey ledge next to a tree’s roots that allowed me to pursue some very faint path to at least get past the big overgrowth obstacle where the litter was.

When I finally got to the other side at 10:05am, that was when I noticed that there was another mining relic as well as a colored ribbon tied to a tree further up a steep slope.

I suspected that the trail leading up to the Allison Mine was up that way, and I doubted that I’d have the energy nor the time to pursue that mine.

Heck, I remembered seeing somewhere that someone referred to that mine as the “legendary” Allison Mine, but now I’ve come to realize that the word is really code for “hardly anyone goes there”.

At this point, I realized that I was probably only at the halfway point or so up the Allison Gulch, and that it was already difficult to even make it up to this point.

That said, I was glad that Allison Gulch Falls was the only goal for this hike so I had time on my side, and I was glad that Mom and I didn’t try to visit this waterfall when we were here about a month ago doing the Bridge to Nowhere and Devil’s Gulch Falls.

And so I continued the slow stream scramble in pursuit of the Allison Gulch knowing that I had already spent about 90 minutes or so in the gulch and I still wasn’t sure how much further I had to go.

It was already further than I had to go for the difficult Buckhorn Falls scramble that I also did last month.

As I continued the rough boulder scrambling with plenty more spots of bushwhacking through overgrowth, I especially had to pay attention to more sections with fallen leaves concealing loose soil or even gaps!

In fact, I had flashbacks of the slow going jungle hiking that I had to do in Puerto Rico where I tried to make sure I wasn’t stepping on wet rocks or rocks that were just too slippery to stay upright.

However, in this case, I actually looked for rocks since I sensed they were better for footing (unless the rocks were loose).

There were also a few fallen trees that I had to duck under (making me even more concerned about a tick jumping down onto me like one must have done at Etiwanda Falls early last year.

After another long interlude of dry hiking, I started to hear and see the stream once again, and finally at around 10:40am, I reached the narrow dead-end where the Allison Gulch Falls spilled into!

There was some kind of wire that was tied to a couple of trees here though I wasn’t sure why they were there unless it might have been a balance aid if the stream was higher or something.

Anyways, I finally had an opportunity to unsling the pack and start documenting this elusive spot, which was probably one of the more difficult local waterfalls that I’ve done to date.

As I was busy trying to explore my immediate surroundings and seeing the tall but thin ribbon of water that was the Allison Gulch Falls, I couldn’t help but notice that someone had left a climbing glove or something next to a tree that I stood next to.

I presumed that other people who have been up this way probably also used a glove to reduce the likelihood of having something bite the hand or even getting a splinter or something.

I had a close call with such a painful splinter on the way up to get to this falls earlier on, and I was fortunate to spot it when the sun struck it at the right angle so I could at least see it (because it was practically invisible otherwise)!

So after savoring the experience, I finally started to head back out at 11:15am, where I wasn’t exactly looking forward to the scramble back through the gulch.

It had taken be around 2 hours to get to the falls, and I expected that it would take a similar amount of time to get back to the East Fork Trail.

And so I went ahead and did the scramble, which might have been a little easier on the way back down simply because of hindsight and that I didn’t have to wonder how much further I needed to go.

And if I hit a bouldering obstacle at a dropoff, I could always sit and scoot my way down.

My GoPro battery ran out again at around 12:25pm, which further proved that this scrambling detour was neither short nor easy by any stretch of the imagination.

It happened at a spot where it looked like all my next available steps involved scrambling through a lot of overgrowth, but I managed to find one route where after ducking through some branches, I eventually regained a faint trail.

And it was from there, that I was able to follow this “trail” back to the mouth of Allison Gulch and the East Fork, where I arrived at around 12:55pm (which was pretty much as I had predicted when I’d be back to this point).

While I realized that I could have made it a really long day by now pursuing the Bridge to Nowhere and Devil’s Gulch Falls, the bigger goal was to get home safely and in time for the Mother’s Day dinner at my parents’ place.

And so I went back downstream along the San Gabriel River before the Swan Rock and ultimately back towards the East Fork Trailhead.

At least when I had to wade through the San Gabriel River beneath the mouth of Allison Gulch, my feet felt pretty good as the water was “refreshing” (i.e. code for “cold”).

It was also funny how I was all alone within Allison Gulch, but I encountered at least three or four parties of hikers (mostly either solo hikers or hiking buddy pairs) on the way back along the East Fork Trail.

That kind of shows you just how popular the Bridge to Nowhere hike is, and it also underscored how I could have beaten these people that were just getting started to the Bridge to Nowhere if I had gone in that direction.

However, I was also rationing my water because I was running out, and I guess if I was ever to do the one-day challenge of visiting all the Bridge to Nowhere Waterfalls, then I’d need at least a third 40oz bottle or more.

Either that, or I’d have to bring my water pump and collapsible bucket so I could use the river to filter the water and keep going.

Eventually by about 1:40pm, I made it back to the familiar graffiti wall, where I had to get back to crossing the San Gabriel River once again, and then five minutes later, I got back to the original first legit river crossing.

By about 2pm, I made it back to Heaton Flat, where I noticed that someone was camping next to the picnic grounds here.

And finally at 2:15pm, I made it back to the car where I couldn’t wait to get out of my soggy socks and shoes.

However, as I removed my waterproof hiking socks, I saw that there was a pool of water inside the sock (no wonder why my steps felt heavier), and I came to the realization that waterproof socks are useless if the water goes higher than the sock!

So really, this experiment with the waterproof socks taught me that they’re only good if you’re trying to go light with a pair of trail runners or something but want to keep the feet dry and you hit shallow crossings.

But if that’s already the case, why not just use a legitimate pair of waterproof hiking boots like the Vasque St Elias like I’ve been doing all along?

And if I knew I had to go through a lot of water hiking where the water goes above the shins, then that’s where a combination of a Trail Runner like the Altra Lone Peak 5 along with some neoprene socks might be the best combo.

Anyways, I got back in the car, let the shoes, insoles, and socks dry on the dashboard, and then drove home.

But the traffic was not great as I was pretty much smack into the rush hour traffic and so the drive home took 90 minutes (a far cry from the roughly 1-hour drive I took earlier this morning).

Nevertheless, I did feel a sense of accomplishment after finally knocking off the last of the Bridge to Nowhere Waterfalls, which was not bad considering that I had never even done the East Fork Trail until this year!

But now there’s a lot of work that comes with the new content, and I still have to get caught up on all the old content (or as much as I can for a few more weeks before the next big trip starting this June)…

Still, I’d imagine that’s a good problem to have as opposed to not having content at all and having to do the field work to get that content in the first place!