This hike was advertised as an attempt to find a new route up Sugarloaf, one which would qualify as a pathfinder route for the new pathfinder emblem. We were successful.
Since this hike was scheduled as part of the Cinco de Mayo Chilibration weekend at Harwood Lodge, a couple of us stayed at Harwood Friday night and met up with the remainder of hikers who were led up from Pomona to the Icehouse Canyon parking area by Bobcat. Initially fifteen hikers assembled at Icehouse (the roadhead) but almost immediately two dropped out, one to join the three T's hike; the other, Mikey Baldwin, because his car was overheating. (This turned out to be a temporary set-back for Mikey because his car problem was corrected and he was able to climb Sugarloaf up a different ridge and rejoin us on the summit.) The remaining thirteen of us began our hike at 8:30am.
A couple of hundred yards into the hike, and after climbing diagonally and steeply up the ridge which terminates at the Mt Baldy Road at the entrance to Icehouse, another hiker checked out. The now twelve of us attained the ridge top and scrambled through dense brush, around minimal class three rock, and over loose scree for about an hour. The brush became too thick and we decided to drop down into the broad wash which begins near the summit and drops northwesterly, paralleling the ridge we had been ascending. The entire route is easily viewed from the Baldy Road below Harwood. The scramble up the wash was primarily over stable, large boulders, but there were some areas of loose scree to be overcome. We arrived at the summit at approximately 11:00 am. Gain was 1900'; mileage about 2 miles. We were greeted by a resting Mikey Baldwin on the summit.
Descent, after a lunch break of 45 minutes, was via Falling Rock canyon and was uneventful. Bobcat led us down. We returned to the cars at 1:30 pm.
Weather that day was extremely hot back in Los Angeles, but our weather was sunny, breezy and moderate in temperature. Some of us then drove up to Harwood Lodge for an afternoon and evening of fun.
