Windy & Cold at El Moro

Saturday, May 22, 2010 ~ As always Patti and I really look forward to the weekends so we can go hiking and log some miles. I had a blister on my heel so we walked only 11 miles each day instead of the 13 or 14 miles we usually like to do. It was nice to take a break. We actually got to hike a new trail called, Elevators. They call it Elevators, coz it’s like you’re hiking down a stone wall. A rope would have been nice to have on this part of the trail. We only have one more small part of a trail to hike, then Patti and I have hiked all the trails at El Moro.

Towards the end of our Saturday hike we ran across a gopher snake, which I was able to catch. Patti of course put about 25 yards between me, the snake and her. About that time these two girls walked up, and one of them asked if she could hold the snake so her friend could take a picture. I handed her the snake and told her to hold him behind his head, so she did, until the snake pulled his head away from her grip and then she tossed the snake behind her and it landed right at Patti’s feet. Yeap, Patti let out a little scream and ran one way and the snake took off another way. It was a perfect ending to our hike.

On Sunday, we invited a lot of friends to come with us, but only AJ showed up. When Patti and I first arrived at El Moro the weather was awful. The cloud cover was blocking out the sun. It was really windy and cold too. We had to wait about 15 minutes for AJ to show up, and by the time she got there the cloud cover went away and it was sunny, but the cold wind ended up staying with us the whole day.

We went up Moro Ridge we then headed left down Sommer Ridge, took another left on, Slow ‘N Easy, and that runs into El Moro Canyon. Patti and I really like this trail even though it’s 3 or 4 miles shorter then we like to go. It was AJ’s first time through the canyon, and she liked it very much. Once we got into the oak trees I asked the girls to stop so I could take a picture, well, AJ looked to her left and saw a bush move, having seen a snake on the side of the trail a few miles back, AJ was a bit jumpy, and screamed, and that made Patti scream and they both jumped in the air, once they both saw it wasn’t a snake, Patti started hitting AJ for making her scared. Very funny stuff!

We had a nice hike through the canyon, once we got out of the trees, and back into the sunlight, I noticed a snake going across the trail, first made sure it wasn’t a rattlesnake, then I grabbed it by the tail and was able to get my hand behind his head so the snake would stop trying to bite me. Patti came and got the camera from me to take the attached pix. I think that was the closest Patti has ever came to a snake on purpose. About two months ago Patti walked within a foot of a rattlesnake, both Patti and the rattler jumped at the same time. Lucky for Patti the rattlesnake jumped right back into the sagebrush, and Patti ran about 100 years back down the trail.

All in all it was a great weekend, we ended both hikes with a sandwich from Gallo's in Corona del Mar overlooking Newport Harbor. We both wished it would have been warmer, and I wished I didn’t have the big blister on my heel, but oh well. Next weekend is Memorial Day, weekend! Patti and I are going to start off the weekend with a hike at Holy Jim Canyon. I haven’t been there for years, but we think it would be nice to try some other places. We’re going to try and hike 50 miles in those three days. I am sure we’ll be able to do it. Hopefully the 2 inch blister on my heel will be healed up by then.

Slow 'N Easy - El Moro Canyon

Sunday, May 16^th - When Patti and I were driving to El Moro for our hike it was about 8:30 in the morning and we had our windshield wipers on! Not good, fortunately it was a light rain and stopped by the time we arrived, although it never warmed up like we had hoped. There was this thick marine layer with us the whole day, at times it felt like we were hiking in the clouds.

Joining Patti and I on this hike was her daughter, Katie, her boyfriend Griffith, Laura and her boyfriend David. We went on our favorite trails, up Moro Ridge we then headed left down Sommer Ridge, took another left on, Slow ‘N Easy, and that runs into El Moro Canyon through the oak trees and back to the rangers’ station. It’s always fun to get out and hike, just wished it was a little warmer. When it’s cold you really don’t have a chance to see any rattlesnakes, we did get to see a deer feeding on a hillside right off of the El Moro Canyon trail.

As a lot of you know already, Patti and I track our miles using our iTouches with the Nike Plus system. You have a sensor in your Nike shoes, and the iTouch has a receiver for the sensor, and it tracks your miles and calories burned, your pace and also the time. It’s a very cool tool to use, if you like to hike, walk or run. Well, we showed the system to Laura, and after we left our 12 mile, 3 and a half hour hike, Laura stopped by the Nike store and bought the shoes and sensor, she already had the iTouch. Yeah, Laura! What’s funny about logging miles via this system, is that it makes you want to log more miles, Patti and I always try to out walk each other. I walk a 5 or 10k in the morning before work and Patti walks at lunch. If you want to learn more about the Nike Plus go to; http://www.nikeplus.com

We’re having another group hike at El Moro this coming Saturday at 8:45. Contact us for details if you would like to join us.

Mother's Day Weekend, El Moro Hikes!

Saturdays hike was really fun. Patti’s long time friend, Joni and her daughter Kristen joined Patti and I on a 14 mile hike through El Moro. I was hoping the girls would see all kinds of wildlife. While Kristen and I were waiting for her mom and Patti to come back to the Rangers’ Station we did see a hawk flying with a squirrel in his talons. The hawk landed in a near by tree and started to eat the squirrel. Kristen said she never saw that before. It was cool to see, nature at work. Once Patti and Joni made it back from the car we started off going up Moro Ridge. It was 9:00 AM, nice and sunny on Saturday. The first part of the hike, you’re hiking right through the Mustard Plants, and you have the awesome view of the ocean and Emerald Bay, baby bunnies are running around, you really don’t notice that you’re hiking almost straight up this huge hill for a mile! We’ve done it about 20 plus times and we still feel it.

Once we got to the top of the hill, Patti and I told our guest that was the hardest part of the hike and everything else from then on was easy. It actually was pretty easy, but they did start to comment on every little hill that we came upon. ;-) Joni is a workout queen at the gym and Kristen is only 16, so they both did the 14 mile hike without any problems. We really didn’t see any wildlife on Saturday, except the normal stuff, but Kristen and I did see the hawk, which was cool.

Sunday the 9^th, Mothers’ Day. It was just Patti and I. We started off the day early, and were on our way at 8:30 up, Moro Ridge again, but this time we wanted to take another trail once we were on the top. There are only a few left in the park we having hiked on.

So after we finished Moro Ridge we then headed left down Sommer Ridge. Just about 500 feet before we hit the trail head for the next leg of our hike we ran into another rattlesnake. This one was a nice one and blended in really well with the brush on the side of the trail. We almost walked right next to him. We stopped for a few pictures and then headed off to a trail we never hiked on before, it’s called Slow ‘N Easy. So far the most scenic trail we’ve been on. It’s on a ridge in between two other ridges we hike on a lot. We saw some flowers that we haven’t seen on the other trails, which was kinda neat. This trail started bending to the left and dropping into the canyon pretty quick, once we hit the floor of the canyon we merge onto another trail called, El Moro Canyon. This was really something; you’re surrounded by these old oak trees that had to be over 100 years old, and you’re under a canopy of trees. There was water running to the left us, next to the canyon wall, and also a few caves are visible. I was wondering where all the wildlife that lives in the park gets their water and I guess we now know. During this part of the hike we heard so many birds, we couldn’t tell what kind of birds there were, coz it was just too many of them. We did see a few that we didn’t recognize, and that was cool too, because you know you’re looking at something special.

On both Saturday and Sunday we did add about 100 pounds of large rocks to Lucy’s memorial. Saturday, Joni’s daughter, Kristen spelled out Lucy for us in white rocks, which was very nice of her. Patti and I both had a great weekend. Over the two days we hiked 25 + miles. Next Sunday we’re bringing another group of friends with us. If you want to come just let us know.

The Facebook advertised, “Frank & Patti's El Moro Hike”

May 2nd, 2010 - This past Sunday our friends and family, Grif, Katie, Laura, Anjanette, Brittany, Alex, Laura, Dana, Chris, Patti and myself all went on our Facebook advertised hike in El Moro. Patti and I were both excited to see so many people come out. We weren’t expecting a lot of people to participate, and come out to the canyon for a day of torture. Actually, only the first part of the hike is a bit difficult. Once we hit the base of the hill that overlooks Emerald Bay, you walk about a mile straight up that hill. We took a few breaks along the way, but everyone made it up the hill just fine.

Along the way some of the girls collected little white rocks to spell out “Lucy” for her memorial. I loaded up my pack with a few larger rocks to add to Lucy’s memorial as well and it’s really taking shape now. This was our 4th visit to the site and with a little help, we want to eventually make a memorial wall with a hole in the center for flowers. Lucy was a large part of my life along with Lucy’s mom Kristen, and all of our friends, and I will miss her forever.

So after adding to Lucy’s site most of our group had other commitments, so we showed them the trail back down to the ranger’s station. They headed down the “I Think I Can” trail…. haven’t heard from them yet, but I’m pretty sure everyone made it okay. That group did get a nice 7 mile hike in.

Now, Patti, AJ and I continued on with our normal hike across Moro Ridge to Sommer Ridge and then took a left on No Name Ridge for the home stretch. Our total hike was 3.3 hours long and 13 miles. It was a really nice day close to 80 degrees and sunny, but the wind did start to pick up. Our original plans were to hike down to Crystal Cove for a picnic but thought it might be too windy so we all three drove to the bluffs in Corona del Mar overlooking the ocean. After we ate the great lunch Patti had prepared the night before, we were all three so tired that we could have taken naps right there on beach towels. On a funny side note, AJ really enjoyed the cookies Patti baked and ate almost a whole bag of them by herself. When Patti and I drove away, AJ drove herself to the back bay and hiked another 8 miles to work off those cookies. She blamed that on me, since I might have been kidding her a little bit, oh well. All in all we had a great time with everyone coming out. Hopefully we all will do this again real soon.

May 1st 2010, El Moro Canyon

El Moro Canyon

Today started off being a perfect day. The weather was nice, the ocean blue, Patti and I both had our Nike Plus systems to count our miles. It was just great! After last weekend, I knew we could collect the big rocks for Lucy memorial closer to the top of the hill, unlike last weekend when I carried 50 pounds of rocks straight up the Moro Ridge for over a mile. Well we collected another 50 pounds of rocks but didn’t have to haul them up hill, but still had to carry them on across the top of the ridge for almost a mile. Lucy’s memorial is going to be the best. I bet once we’re happy with it, it’ll be built with 500 pounds of rocks. All carried there by friends and family with Love.

Back to the perfect day… So Patti and I are 2/3rd into our 13 mile hike. Patti says, “This is the first hike I haven’t lost any miles on my Nike Plus” I said “I wouldn’t say that” well about a mile after that, Patti lost all her miles. It was due to human error, not totally Patti’s fault, but an unfortunate set of things happened that lead to her miles not registering. I felt bad, and Patti started stomping instead of hiking, with her arms crossed. She was very upset.

It was a beautiful day, a great hike, Patti wasn’t real happy, but towards the end of the hike she started smiling again. Tomorrow is our big Facebook advertised, “Frank & Patti's El Moro Hike” It’s the same hike we did today, kinda wanted to hike the trail before we brought up our friends on Sunday.