Mount San Antonio, Pine Mountain #1, Dawson Peak

22 July 2001

By: Kate Rogowski

Leaders: Kate Rogowski and Janet Yang

On Sunday, July 22, at 6:30 am, 11 hikers assembled at the Baldy Rideshare. The leaders, Kate Rogowski and Janet Yang, had practiced this hike on July 14 with the help of Dave Zalewski who also returned for a final performance. Besides these three, others there were Rich Iverson, Don Tidwell, Martin Parsons, Lilly Fukui, Christian Clemenson, Stephen Judge, Nga Lam and Valapa Saubhayana.

The schedule read, "13.5 miles and 6,200 feet of gain. Strenuous" but did not describe climbing 3,900 feet to Mount Baldy by way of the ski hut, dropping 1200 feet to the saddle, climbing 700 feet to Dawson Peak, dropping 300 feet and climbing 200 feet at a 45 degree angle to Pine Mountain and retracing our steps. There was no flat trail in the entire trip, but what do you expect in the mountains?

What a great day we had! The temperature was moderate. The sky was interesting but not threatening, and the breezes cooling, not chilling. We appeared to be a good group; in synch.

We were on the trail by 7:20. Shortly thereafter, Rich and Chris signed out and roared up the ridge to the peak. Wow! Very impressive! We were at the ski-hut by 8:52 and atop Baldy by 11:10. Rich and Chris were waiting for us. Erik Siering came up from the village which he had left at 8:10, three hours before. One of the group opted to stay on the peak and photograph and socialize while the remainder went for Dawson and Pine.

We left Baldy at 11:20 and were at Dawson Peak (9500 feet) at 12:45. Rich and Chris were just leaving but stayed to chat. The register that was missing on July 14 was still missing. The next person up may remember to replace it.

We began the 400 foot descent from Dawson at 1:10, made it up the 500 foot ascent to Pine Mountain (9600 feet) by 1:55.

Again, Rich and Chris were graciously there. We ate. Both leaders had brought green tea candy for the group. Magic!!!

At 2:20 we started back from Pine. No one asked to redo Dawson. On this part of the hike we had a wonderful addition to the group. Lilly and Val's friend, Larry Pirrone and Ed Nemeth, were on their way to Pine having come up from the village. They joined our party.

It occurred to us that now we were over the number of hikers we had started with, and, since Rich and Chris were sticking close to us, we could sell two hikers to a group which had lost more than their 10 percent allotment. If we sold them by the pound, with Larry at 195 and Ed at 205, we could make a good donation to HPS.

We had completed the 1,200 foot climb to Baldy by 4:20 and headed back to the trailhead at 4:40.

The group, now 13, arrived at Manker Flat at 7:00 pm, Janet sweeping her heart out. The group was wonderful, the weather great, good feelings abounding.