Cleghorn Ridge Trail
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2010 - Forecast - 90% chance of showers. Not a good way to start the day, a day that had been planned for almost 2 months with the HummerXClub.
Cleghorn Ridge Trail - The entire trail is a fire road with a more challenging trail winding back and forth across the fire road. It starts at the Cajon Pass, 15 fwy and Cleghorn Rd and runs to highway 138 by Silverwood Lake. This dirt trail is about 14 miles long each way. The trail starts at about 3,000 feet and peaks out about 5,200 feet and has lots of side trails that criss-cross the main easy road. The roughly graded route in this trail is suitable for medium clearance 2WD in dry weather. The trail is considered extreme when very wet. The US Forest Service has designated this trail as 2N47.
During our drive out there, the rain got worse and worse. Cleghorn is at the base of the foothills and traverses up the mountains. It happened to be in the path of the storm. Before we even got there, we had strong winds, rain and hail. We got there with a little time to spare so we hit McDonald's for breakfast before we met up with the club down on Cleghorn Road.
We pulled in under the freeway overpass to air down the tires. We were the first ones there. It was pretty cool to see other Hummer owners pull up and to the side to air-down to get ready to go wheeling. We finally got to meet a few from the club and exchanged names. Our good friends Laura and Sheldon H. with their kids Jewel and Ethan showed up in their Jeep. Seth, our group leader, gave a short meeting on rules and what to expect, before long everyone was ready to hit the trail.
We took the trail headed east towards Silverlake. The trail snaked its way up the side of the mountain crossing pools of water as he kept heading up. Off our left shoulder was a valley with a small rainbow sitting in it. Our first optional play area was Powerline Hill. Basically it's just a hill climb to the top where sits a power line tower. This was the first time stepping out of the vehicle since ascending. As I placed my foot down, the ground beneath felt like melted chocolate. I didn't realize how much mud we were driving through. It became more apparent as some of the guys were trying to go up the steep incline only to loose traction and slide back down. After a while of playing there we continued on.
This is where it got interesting.
We headed up a rather steep incline as the rain begin to intensify. The lead H3, Seth, got to a point where he couldn't keep his momentum going and began to loose traction. Before too long Seth could go no further. We got out and stacked some rocks to help keep the rear passenger tire from dropping into a deep rut and bottoming out. He was able to reverse out, turn a round, and head back to the main fire-road, upon which we all followed behind.
Later on down the road I took a wrong line and kept getting sucked in to a rut. The mud made for a huge amount of grief. I eventually tried to turn the rig around and got high-centered on a berm. After a quick strap yank we were headed back up the mountain. The rain and hail made even the easiest parts of the trail challenging. Going up and around corners in the mud and driving rain was almost like slow speed drifting, with the exception of the mountain cliffs on the side.
We had a great day out on the trails, a new trip is being planned to explore this trail once again in dry weather. This way we will be able to get a better view from up on top instead of driving through the clouds. Although the views that were presented to us were quite spectacular, I’m sure on a clear day it will be much more grand, especially when there is not the worry of getting stuck, cold wind and driving rain.
Until next time.