Flora and Fauna

Journeys To Echo Mountain

By Christopher Nyerges

My very first introduction to the Angeles National Forest was the Sam Merrill Trail at the top of Lake Avenue in Altadena. My brother and neighborhood friends would typically just walk up Lake Avenue from our home just below Woodbury Road. Sometimes we’d get a ride, and then we’d hike up what seemed a tremendously long and tiring trail to Echo Mountain. In fact, the trail is probably not even three miles, but back then, with the switchbacks and dryness of summer, it seemed as if we were entering a different time zone, as if we were going into the past.

Finally at the top, we never had a shortage of things to see and things to do. And remember, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Echo Mountain seemed much more wild than it is today. Back then, the visitors were fewer, and there were no interpretive signs for the tourists. We would carefully walk amidst the many yucca plants, trying to determine the exact dimensions of the old hotel and other buildings. Once, my hiking partner Joe Sierra and I spent the afternoon discovering about pine nuts. We had seen pine nuts from the store, and we’d eaten them, and so when we found a huge pine cone from one of the old trees on Echo Mountain, we decided to figure out how to get the seeds. The cone we found was huge, but not fully mature, so the scales were closed. We just took a rock and gradually broke open the cone, bit by bit, while the thin-shelled black seeds fell out, one by one. We thought they were delicious!

On clear days, we had that incredible vista and could actually see the two peaks of Catalina Island. In fact, regardless of the air and smog conditions, we often ended our trip by sitting atop the old cement staircase just looking down at the sprawling city to the south. It gave us such a superior view, such a lofty vantage point that we felt truly set apart, as if the city we were looking at below was something other than our home. It was this very loftiness that gave rise to so many of our philosophical discussions about the nature of life and the eventual result of overpopulation.

Gradually, I would visit Echo Mountain in every season, at all times of the day and night, in rain, snow, and heat.

Echo Mountain used to be a great spot to view the fireworks on the Fourth of July. We’ve begin our hike in the late afternoon, view the fireworks and have a meal, and then get back to Altadena around midnight.

Sticky Monkey FlowerI’ve very much enjoyed early morning summer hikes up the Sam Merrill Trail, viewing the many flowering plants along the way, flowers that are only seen after a wet spring, such as the miner’s lettuce, and monkey flower, and Indian paintbrush and many other delicate flowers. To me, in those early mornings with dew on the spider webs and a bit of fog still in the air, the trail and the surroundings were sacred land. They were a place of mental and physical development, and a time where I could find my spiritual roots.

I have only traveled up the path of the incline to Echo Mountain on a few occasions. My friend Daniel McPherson first showed me the way, and we saw many of the wooden foundations of the incline, and even some of the old rails. Though eroded in sections, we were able to hike most of the old route starting from Rubio Canyon all the way up to Echo Mountain.

I have lost count of how many times I’ve been to Echo Mountain because I have been there so many times. It was like my backyard. And since leading hiking classes for Pasadena and Glendale City Colleges, I have taken hundreds of students there and encountered many others there on the top.

Two interesting encounters come to mind.

Once, about 13 years ago, my hiking class and I met a man at the top who said he was there to win a bet. He was apparently skilled in primitive fire starting, primitive weapons, shelter making, and generally seemed to know how to live off the land. When we met him, he’d already made a dozen or so arrowheads from the broken glass scattered around Echo Mountain, and he’d made arrow shafts as well. He said he was going to make a bow soon and use them to capture some of his meals. He’d planned to close in that old huge fireplace and use it as his shelter for the following week. For fire, he said he’d use a bow and drill. I was impressed. He said he had to stay there for 10 days with only what he carried in -- which was just his clothes and a knife -- and if he came out OK, he’d win the bet. (I don’t recall what he’d win). Since I wanted to know the outcome, I gave him my magnesium fire starter and my business card in exchange for his promise that he’d contact me when he got out and tell me how it went. I never heard from him.

On another occasion, our entire hiking class had finished lunch on one January afternoon. It began to snow! I was surprised that it would snow at such a location, but we marveled in it. As we were departing, a woman and her girl scouts came by and asked if we had any matches. "No, I never carry any," I told her. She said they were out on the third day of week-long backpacking trip and ran out of their book matches. She said they got moist and were all used up. I was a bit amazed that anyone would depend on book matches, and I gave her my magnesium fire starter and a quick demonstration. With that tool, she’d have no problems, except for the snow, and we quickly departed. (I never heard back from her either. Fortunately, I never read about her and her girls in the paper).

The Echo Mountain area is really one of the great historic spots in the Angeles National Forest, as well as a good spot to study the flora, fauna, and to view the city. Always play it safe and carry a canteen of water, a magnesium fire starter, a good knife (such as a Swiss Army knife), and tell someone your itinerary. A good local trail book is John Robinson's TRAILS OF THE ANGELES.


Nyerges' latest book, ENTER THE FOREST, about the Angeles National Forest, is now available.  He is also the author of GUIDE TO WILD FOODS, and TESTING YOUR OUTDOOR SURVIVAL SKILLS.  His books are available  at all Sport Chalet stores and via Shcool of Self-reliance, Box 41834, Eagle Rock, CA 90041. A copy of his class and outing schedule is also available from SOS, or on-line at http://home.earthlink.net/~nyerges/.


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Last modified: February 12, 1999

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