Читать книгу 101 Hikes in Southern California. Exploring Mountains, Seashore, and Desert онлайн

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As you continue, the oaks clustering along the canyon bottom thin out, and you can gaze upward, to your right, at the whitish sedimentary outcrop known as the Baleen Wall. The trail narrows and becomes rocky in places. At 4.1 miles, reach a T-junction at Shepherds Flat. Pause here for a picnic, perhaps, before resuming your trip.

From the corral continue west on the narrow Sheep Corral Trail through the brush. This is a segment of the Juan Bautista de Anza National Historic Trail, a 1,200-mile trail commemorating the Spanish captain’s famed 1775 expedition leading 240 people across the desert to found San Francisco. You pass over a saddle and briefly descend to meet the graded-dirt Palo Comado Canyon Trail (5.2 miles). Turn left now, and commence a short mile of crooked descent on the wide dirt road. You look down on a lovely tapestry of canyon-bottom woods and slopes adorned with dense patches of chaparral and sandstone outcrops. Soon you are amid those woods, which are mostly live oaks and sycamores. The going is easy for another 2 miles as you proceed almost imperceptibly downhill along the canyon bottom.