Black Mountain in a Passenger Car

[Hikin_Jim]

Well, I"m going to pit my Honda Accord against the Black Mtn Road in an attempt to hike the Fuller Ridge Trail tomorrow morning. Wish me luck.

HJ

[SoCal Mike]

Good luck! As you know, it will be the some of the longest few miles of your life.

If you ever took the road to the Holy Jim Trail in the Santa Ana Mountains, that one was a doozy, too. The fillings in my teeth are still rattling. (Thankfully they have made many improvements on that road.)

Enjoy your trip, Jim.

Michael

[Hikin_Jim]

Well, hopefully it's doable.

(and I have done Holy Jim, multiple times, in my Accord)

HJ

[Florian]

Jim, i understand from one of the Black Mtn fire lookout hosts that the road was recently graded and in good shape. At least to Black Mtn. Not sure about all the way to Fuller Ridge trailhead.

Edit: Just noticed you will be going up on Friday. Was thinking you were going on Sat. So i guess you know by now what condition the road is in.

-Florian

[Hikin_Jim]

The road is in really pretty good shape up to where the turn off to Black Mountain is. Even beyond that, over to the Fuller Ridge Trailhead, the road was in decent shape. You had to go around big bump rocks, but for a dirt road, this is to be expected. It was no problem for my Honda Accord.

HJ

[zippetydude]

Seems to me that road is always passable. The Fish Creek dirt road has always been a problem, and even though I imagine they've completely bulldozed it to a smooth surface with all the fire trucks coming and going, I fear for what will happen to it once the rainy season gets here. I can imagine, especially if we get a good strong El Nino rain year, that the road will develop huge ruts now that the runoff is going to be so exaggerated after the fire.

On a lighter note, how was your trip?

z

[Hikin_Jim]

Good trip. I climbed Joyce Peak and Mt St Ellens, accessing the area via the Fuller Ridge Trail. Multiple springs/sources were running although only one was of any volume.
N Prong N Fork San Jacinto River: Just a trickle
Lower Bed Springs Crossing: Good flow
Deer Springs Crossing - Dry (at the crossing), barely a trickle down in the camp area
Upper Bed Springs Crossing: Good flow
Rock Spring: Just a trickle
Lilly Spring: Flowing slowly
LRV Crossing: Dry.
Owl's Hooch Crossing: Dry.
Middle Fork Stone Canyon: Dry.
North Fork Stone Canyon: Dry.

Important tip: If you've ever thought about taking a short cut from the summit plateau area of the San Jacintos down to the PCT via the Middle Fork of Stone Creek, don't. It's ugly, ugly, ugly. Brush, and I mean brush. Ceanothus and chinquapin mostly. And big boulders. Really big. Yipes. I had to bail out and cut over some ridges. Took me hours longer than if I had just used the trail. Some "short cut".

I was hoping to find water in the Middle Fork of Stone Creek, but no such luck. I only had a swallow of water left when I hit the PCT, but fortunately Lower Bed Springs Crossing was only a mile or so away.

HJ