Mt. Deception, Mt. Disappointment, San Gabriel Peak

5 January 2005

By: Edith Liu

Dorothy, Mars and I opted for Deception, San Gabriel and Disappointment. The Mt. Wilson Road was closed, so we walked the short distance to 2N52, which had been plowed, but had snow and ice on it. There we put on our snowshoes and decided to try the JPL trail. The snow condition for snowshoeing was perfect. The many low-hanging branches, however, (heavily loaded with snow and ice), caused quite an obstacle. About 2/3 up the trail we decided to scramble to the road. It had plenty of snow on it, so we continued with our snowshoes. At the beginning of the trail to San Gabriel Peak we found tracks of a hiker, but they disappeared halfway up. The bench on the summit was covered with a foot of snow, and the can I had placed in November (and Mars signed the register just three weeks ago) was either gone or under two or more feet of snow. On Disappointment, too, we failed to dig out the can. Who thought we would ever do a 100% snowshoe hike to these low local mountains?