Friday, April 29, 2011

Montecito Trail Ride 4-29-11 MTF

A ride from the end of Park Lane, across the Wiman Trail to the Old Pueblo Trail,  across the McMenemy to the Vincent Trail, and then scrambled up the Vincent to the Edison Catway, back down the Girard and the San Ysidro, in the front country range of the Los Padres Forest in Southern California.
Length: 5.4 miles
Duration: 3 hours
Difficulty: Strenuous. Well maintained trails lead to the Vincent, a very steep single track rock trail, an extreme steady climb, not for the faint of heart.
Altitude gain: 1280 ft
Grade: II

View Montecito in a larger map

This is the view from just below the Edison Catway looking at Santa Barbara Harbor.
On this ride we started at Park Lane in Montecito, went up the Wiman Trail to the Old Pueblo Trail,   across the McMenemy to the Vincent Trail, and then scrambled up the Vincent to the Edison Catway. This part was exceedingly difficult as the Vincent was pretty much a straight steep wall of rocks, and while our mules did it flawlessly I would NOT want to ever try coming DOWN it and would advise horse riders against it. I also saw a large black rattlesnake slithering across the trail on the rocks. After coming to the Catway we went a short distance across the Edison and came back down the Girard Trail, McMenemy and then came out on the San Ysidro to our rigs.


This was my first attempt to make a map of a trail using GPS, and I couldn't get a photo yet that I could embed. But the MapApp works and that's a start!