Carrizo Gorge Wilderness Backpack - ABDSP

Gary and I spent the long 3 day Memorial Day weekend leisurely traversing the Carrizo Gorge Wilderness with no more of an agenda other than getting back to our trucks sometime by the end of the day Monday. Mr Tom was kind enough to drop us off at Jacumba on Sat morning and was going to hike with us for the day but the weather was kinda cold and blustery and I guess his jacuzzi and booze back home sounded better so it was just Gary and I.

Carrizo Gorge is one of those easy to get to wilderness areas that just never gets old and it has a long history with the railroad and the now famous Goat Canyon Trestle. The trestle seems to be growing exponentially in popularity and I suspect that will continue until the railway patrols pickup again. This particular trip we saw as many as 10 motorcycle adventurers in addition to all of the usual hikers and MTB'ers.

There is something about the Gorge that seems to beckon film photography and I always enjoy taking at least one older analog camera with me. The B/W photos here are from my Fuji GW690 6x9 medium format camera and the film is Fuji Acros 100 developed 1+2+100 in PMK Pyro @13 minutes. A few of the photos I took were an attempt to mirror photos found in the The Impossible Railroad book.

Carrizo Gorge with Sombrero Peak way off in the distance to the right


Following the tracks, some of the trestles are in good shape, others not so much


One particular set of railway cars that has been out on the tracks for several years now has been heavily vandalized.


On page 36 of The Impossible Railroad book there is a picture showing the Young & Crooks Camp 1 and all of the workers tents and the compressor plant equipment. This is the roughly the same photograph but the only thing you can still see are foundations of cement and many of the cleared areas that were built up with rocks to form a tiered foundation for the large tents they used


Gary at a few of the railroad camps


This workers camp overlooks the gorge and has approx 5-6 built up tiers for large tents. Most of it is overgrown with cholla now though.




Here is another photo from The Impossible Railroad book
on page 40 showing tunnel 15 where they eventually gave up on that tunnel and built the tracks around it


We found a huge horseshoe, looked more decorative than useful


This is one of the cooler tunnels out there


Gary heading into tunnel 16, this one has a history of fires and collapses which is evidenced by the tweak on the top. The inside supports you see in the other tunnels are missing which I am guessing is from the 1986 fire that burned it out


What would a trip thru the Gorge be without a photo of the Trestle


Eventually we found our way to the East Fork and the Carrizo Palms. There was some water and lots of wildlife tracks


Unfortunately this poor gal was not able to make it to the water source. I was able to go out a few days later with a Fish & Game Biologist to perform a post-mortem and the cause of death was determined to be from disease


Rock Art



I did manage to get some digital shots as well, love the sunrise photos with a super zoom


The Goat Canyon Trestle has several "catwalks" built in to facilitate repairs and maintenance duties and there is also an elaborate fire supression system built into the trestle with many pipes and valves that lead up to the water tanker on the hillside above. This photo is looking straight thru the first catwalk and some of the water pipes are visible. I can't recommend walking these catwalks at all, they are sketchy at best


Gary enjoying some of the water at Carrizo Palms


Reptiles were out and about, we found 2 in the same spot with head injuries, pretty strange, anybody have any ideas? We were thinking hawks or such




This guy was chilling in the shade of the tunnels


Railroad camp debris, re-purposing a shovel for something?


This is more my speed, a real fifth bottle of whisky


Anyways, thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed...time to turn in.....




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The Impossible Railroad & Carrizo Gorge Solo Backpack

Spent a few days hiking and backpacking around Jacumba and Carrizo Gorge with an emphasis on trying to find some of the old railroad construction camps. Inspired by the book The Impossible Railroad I backpacked out into the Gorge battling the Tamarisk and ticks and found several of the camps, train wreckage, historic artifacts and even more interest in this fascinating story of a railway that was jinxed from the beginning. I encourage you to read this book if you want to learn more about the history and see many unpublished photos of the railroad as it progressed from 1919 to our present day fiasco it still is.

I will post some of my favorite photos of the trip here but you can see many more in my photo gallery here

The railroad tracks are completely blocked off as of 02-14-2015 at the De Anza resort. The old train cars that have been off to the side for years have been pulled up onto the tracks completely blocking access to railway vehicles. You can see in this picture that whatever large vehicle it took to move those rail cars have dented and smashed down the actual tracks. The picture is deceiving, it looks like the rail car is on the tracks normally but they are actually laid cross wise on the tracks, like a big tractor or such just dragged them up and onto the tracks at an angle.



Young & Crooks Camp 1 down in the gorge


Most of the construction sites built up tiered foundations on the hillsides. They were very elaborate and quite impressive






Debris from the construction camp




The May 1965 derailed Coors Beer trailer


The wheels wedged into a dry fall


I found several small rooms dug into the hillsides that must have served as offices or temporary shelters






Or perhaps they were the supply rooms for the important stuff


Plenty of beautiful blooms starting to happen now




Most of the tunnel bypass roads were clear but some had landslide debris covering them or worse cholla land mines, this one I did not win, I took heavy casualties, even my hiking pole got several stuck on it!


Here is a nice view down the gorge towards the Seven Sisters and in the foreground is the original tunnel 15


A bit more old debris in some other construction sites










About the only graffiti I wasn't discouraged to see



Total Mylar Balloons this trip - 5 (no pictures sorry..!)


More photos in my gallery here

6 Days in the Turtle and Orocopia Mountains

We were supposed to spend 6 days exploring the Turtle Mountains but the cold, windy weather changed our plans and after 4 days we drove over to the Orocopia Mountains to spend the last couple of days, it was marginally warmer. I really wanted to get to Castle Rock but that didn't happen, we mostly hiked around the Lost Arch Inn and Mexican Hat trail. Don't expect to get very close in your car (legally) to the Turtles, it is mostly Wilderness boundaries now and most of the old jeep roads in are posted as no vehicle access. Browns Camp and the Lost Arch Inn are easily accessible though.



First night camp near Browns Camp and the Mexican Hat Trail


Sunrises were great




Some more starry night shots


My camp setup just after dusk


The Lost Arch Inn








The Car Corral




Coffin Spring area




The Lisa Dawn Cupola Mine is was left as is but with a large metal cover




Mexican Hat and trail area






Here are some photos of the Heritage Trail area and Mopah/Umpah Peaks. We didn't get a chance to hike to them, the weather kept us away with strong winds, rain and some light snow






I even broke out the bug hut and tarp for the weather


I guess they call them the Turtle's for a reason


We packed up and started out for the Orocopia Mountains but first stopped by West Well, lots of wild burros out there


Some petros and gorgeous colors in the hills




We took the Red Canyon Trail into the Orocopia's, it was a fairly easy 2WD high clearance road


Lots of great colors down in the canyon


We camped out near Gucci Spring and hiked around the area


Gary pointing out the wildlife watering hole


A Selfie at our camp near Gucci Spring, it was damn cold every night, teens and low 20's, freezing bottles each night


More sunset stuff


Salt Creek bridge on the Bradshaw Trail, that is Rabbit Peak way off in between the bridge, it has snow on it


Last day out we hiked Painted Canyon in the Mecca Hills, a really neat canyon I thought








You can see Gary down at the bottom of this huge canyon wall


Total Mylar Balloons this trip - 6


You can see more photos here

Turtle Mountains Photos

Orocopia Mountains Photos