Adventure with friends in Highland
On Wednesday, I was at home working, when I got a text message from Jane. She had invited me to "walk a trail" in Highland with her and Bryan (Scotty's Brother). We also invited Scotty along. When I read trail, I was expecting to do some real hiking in the hills here in East Highland. After work, I packed up my back pack with both my Nikon and Canon cameras, first aid kit, two water bottles, and some food. I met them all at Scotty's house.
When we got ready to go, we had learned that Bryan was just wanting to walk on the cement paths that go through the Highland Ranch, which started on the north side of Arroyo Verde Elementary. We started to walk north, and enjoying each other's company and the outside weather. We wanted to enjoy the nice weather, which it was in the low 80s, because on the weekend, we will go back to the low 100s. After walking for about ten mins, we started talking about how we were expecting something more like hiking on the hiking trails in the hills. Bryan decided that he would be fine with going into the hills, and we turned around, got into the cars and headed over to Bryan's wife's parents house off of Alta Vista in Highland.
We got to the house, and walked into the backyard. Their house just happened to be right in front of the Northfork Hiking Trail, well the end of the Northfork Hiking Trail. At the end of the backyard was a 6 foot brick wall we had to climb over to get onto the trail. At first, I started to get iffy if I wanted to climb over the wall, and Jane was the same. Luckily, about half way up, there was a hole from a broken brink in the wall. This made it real simple to get over the wall. After we jumped over the wall, Bryan wanted to take us to a cool spot near the creek. For those who don't know the area, our hills are very dry chaparral desert like habitat. When we think of creeks, they are normally all dried up, or flows just a little bit after a rain. We walked about 1/4 of a mile, and we saw a group of trees. We walked down a hill, into the trees, and the habitat dramatically changed to a lush green forest habitat. I was just totally shocked that this even existed. We got to the Plunge Creek, were there was a good amount of water, slowly flowing down from the San Bernardino Mountains, filled with lush green amber trees, and filled with wildlife.
I went to grab my camera out of the backpack, and noticed I scared away a baby frog. Saw it in the water, and tried to take a photo of it. I told everyone else about the frog, and Bryan came over to catch it. It was a cool small frog, and I was able to get a photo of it in his hand before it jumped back into the water. When you look around, there is this large gentile pool the creek formed. In the pool, was tons of insects, tad poles, and frogs. I knew we were in a very rare riparian habitat, that most people do not know about, and at this point, I wish that this will be protected forever, so that is stays this way. The temperature of the area dropped 20 degrees. I could totally just sit here all day, and listen to the creek flowing while watching the wildlife. Sadly, some other people do know of this place, for there were tons of broken beer/alcohol bottles and trash around. It just makes me so sick that people have to come to places like this, and trash such a rare habitat as like this.
After exploring the area, we started walking north along the creek, climbing over all the trees and rocks. Had to try to avoid all the spider webs. They were everywhere, which was a good sign, for that means people don't come up here and adventure around. We had to use long sticks at some points to clear the spider webs to continue north. We did get to see some really cool looking spiders on their webs, just waiting for their prey to fly into the webs. After heading north through the creek, we decided to get out of the creek area, for it was just getting hard to move around with the amount of trees and spider webs in the area. We climbed out of the little canyon the creek has made, and within about 200 feet, we were right out of the lush green forest environment, and right back into the dry, brown, dead chaparral environment. At this point, there was no trail. We were just walking north, hoping to go back to the creek later on. I started to regret wearing shorts. Tons of plants were just poking at my legs and arm like crazy. I was worried for two things at this point. A rattlesnake and getting ticks on my legs. It would have been more enjoyable if I had jeans. We were walking on a dead grass, which wasn't a good thing, because the dead grass was real slippery. I was walking, and I stepped on a rock with that slippery grass, and with moving the speed I was, I rolled my ankle, and it was very painful. I had to stop right there to let the pain stop. At first, i freaked out that I broke my ankle, but I moved my foot around, and it seemed ok. Everyone stopped and waited for me to recover. Five mins later, I was ready to continue on, but I was starting to get uncomfortable exploring the area, with no official trail, without jeans and now that my ankle was kinda hurt. I convinced Bryan to head back, and we walked back to the Northfork Trail.
We headed west on the Northfork Trial, then turn and headed east and up the hill, as if it was a very big switchback. We stopped about 2/3's of a mile up the second part, in the shade, and just enjoyed looking at the view over some of the homes of east Highland, the Santa Ana River, and the east side of Redlands/Mentone. After enjoying the view, the breeze, and company, we decided to head back, for it was getting close to dinner time, and the sun was starting to set. We got a little bit down the trail, and Bryan didn't want to walk the path, so he left us, and cut through the thick chaparral. I wasn't going to do it, for it seemed steep, I was wearing shorts, and my ankle was still hurting. After Bryan left, we continued walking, about 300 feet, and we ran into a rattle snake. They actually saw the snake quickly move into a bush to hide as it began to rattle, but since I was behind them, I just heard the super loud rattling noise that sounded like a super big sprinkler. Scotty and Jane ran, while I froze and backed up away from where the snake was. I was scared for my life at this point. Scotty and Jane kept trying to get me to run past the snake, but in my head, I thinking that wasn't such a good idea. After about min, the snake stopped rattling, and I still was freaking out. I asked Scotty to come closer to me, to reassure me that it was safe, since I had no clue were the snake was. Soon, the snake starting rattling again, and since Scotty came closer, I felt it was ok, so I started to walk fast/ almost running past the snake. Apparently, the snake was about 20 feet from us in a bush. After I calmed down a bit, I was curious as to what type of rattlesnake it was. Jane and Scotty mention that it had a good thick body, almost as big as a fist, and it was almost a dark color with light yellow strips, but they were unsure since they only saw it for a split second. After thinking about it, I made the conclusion that we ran into a Southern Pacific Rattlesnake. I did some research on google, looking at photos of both, and the photos of the Pacific Rattlesnake fit the description of what Scotty and Jane saw. Now I am kinda sad I didn't get to officially see it, and able to get a photograph of the snake. Only seen one rattlesnake in the wild, and it was just a baby snake in Yosemite Valley over ten years ago.
We walked back to the wall, met up with Bryan, and climbed on over again, and headed back to Scotty's house. Bryan left, and we chilled before going to have dinner at Del Taco. Afterwards, we decided we didn't want to stop having an adventure, so we decided to do some night geocaching. We found a few, and others we couldn't find. One geocache, that is hidden at the fire station on baseline, we spent 30 mins looking for, but had no luck. We felt that someone must have removed it from the hiding spot. One geocache that was kinda cool, took us on another major hiking trail in Highland, called the Shelton Trail. We just had to walk up about 530 feet from baseline. While walking up, we heard an animal quickly climb up a tree, and can just hear it's claws digging into the wood. We looked, but couldn't see it. We figured it was a scared Opossum. We found the cache, and went back down to find others. Another cache took us just outside the Highland Reservoir/Lake on the East Highland Ranch. From the gate entrance, we walked around a habitat rehabilitation area and the cache was hidden over a bridge style fence above a water drainage pipe that was flowing with water. Scotty had to find that one, for there was tons of climbing, and my ankle wouldn't have liked that. Jane was a little frightened of the area, for we heard animals moving around in the dark foliage. After some geocaching, we decided to call it a night. I was very very dirty, I had to go home and take a long shower to get all the dirt and stuff off, but it felt good because what is an adventure without getting dirty :)
When we got ready to go, we had learned that Bryan was just wanting to walk on the cement paths that go through the Highland Ranch, which started on the north side of Arroyo Verde Elementary. We started to walk north, and enjoying each other's company and the outside weather. We wanted to enjoy the nice weather, which it was in the low 80s, because on the weekend, we will go back to the low 100s. After walking for about ten mins, we started talking about how we were expecting something more like hiking on the hiking trails in the hills. Bryan decided that he would be fine with going into the hills, and we turned around, got into the cars and headed over to Bryan's wife's parents house off of Alta Vista in Highland.
After exploring the area, we started walking north along the creek, climbing over all the trees and rocks. Had to try to avoid all the spider webs. They were everywhere, which was a good sign, for that means people don't come up here and adventure around. We had to use long sticks at some points to clear the spider webs to continue north. We did get to see some really cool looking spiders on their webs, just waiting for their prey to fly into the webs. After heading north through the creek, we decided to get out of the creek area, for it was just getting hard to move around with the amount of trees and spider webs in the area. We climbed out of the little canyon the creek has made, and within about 200 feet, we were right out of the lush green forest environment, and right back into the dry, brown, dead chaparral environment. At this point, there was no trail. We were just walking north, hoping to go back to the creek later on. I started to regret wearing shorts. Tons of plants were just poking at my legs and arm like crazy. I was worried for two things at this point. A rattlesnake and getting ticks on my legs. It would have been more enjoyable if I had jeans. We were walking on a dead grass, which wasn't a good thing, because the dead grass was real slippery. I was walking, and I stepped on a rock with that slippery grass, and with moving the speed I was, I rolled my ankle, and it was very painful. I had to stop right there to let the pain stop. At first, i freaked out that I broke my ankle, but I moved my foot around, and it seemed ok. Everyone stopped and waited for me to recover. Five mins later, I was ready to continue on, but I was starting to get uncomfortable exploring the area, with no official trail, without jeans and now that my ankle was kinda hurt. I convinced Bryan to head back, and we walked back to the Northfork Trail.
We walked back to the wall, met up with Bryan, and climbed on over again, and headed back to Scotty's house. Bryan left, and we chilled before going to have dinner at Del Taco. Afterwards, we decided we didn't want to stop having an adventure, so we decided to do some night geocaching. We found a few, and others we couldn't find. One geocache, that is hidden at the fire station on baseline, we spent 30 mins looking for, but had no luck. We felt that someone must have removed it from the hiding spot. One geocache that was kinda cool, took us on another major hiking trail in Highland, called the Shelton Trail. We just had to walk up about 530 feet from baseline. While walking up, we heard an animal quickly climb up a tree, and can just hear it's claws digging into the wood. We looked, but couldn't see it. We figured it was a scared Opossum. We found the cache, and went back down to find others. Another cache took us just outside the Highland Reservoir/Lake on the East Highland Ranch. From the gate entrance, we walked around a habitat rehabilitation area and the cache was hidden over a bridge style fence above a water drainage pipe that was flowing with water. Scotty had to find that one, for there was tons of climbing, and my ankle wouldn't have liked that. Jane was a little frightened of the area, for we heard animals moving around in the dark foliage. After some geocaching, we decided to call it a night. I was very very dirty, I had to go home and take a long shower to get all the dirt and stuff off, but it felt good because what is an adventure without getting dirty :)
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