Songs of the Wilderness

The Fall is probably one of the nicer times of year to visit Little Pine as the temperature for the hike is mild and with the wild grasses having turned gold it makes for some great scenery. Little Pine Mountain is not for the faint of heart, it is about 12 miles roundtrip, 4 of which are uphill, but the views are spectacular and are well worth the effort.

Little Pine Mountain

You’ll want to start early in the morning to allow yourself the whole day for this hike. Make sure to bring plenty of water and something to eat. To get to the trailhead take State Route 154 to Paradise Road and continue to the kiosk at the first crossing. You will need an adventure pass, which you can buy at the kiosk. Continue on Paradise Road as it crosses the Santa Ynez River and then turn left, head towards Upper Oso campground and park just past Upper Oso at the locked gate where the paved road ends.

The trail follows the Buckhorn Camuesa Road, which often has motorcycle and OHV (off highway vehicle) traffic and then at the .75 mile mark leaves the road and becomes the Santa Cruz Trail. Another mile later one arrives at the turn off for Nineteen Oaks, it’s here that the trail begins its climb out of the Oso Valley towards Little Pine Mountain. 

The first part of the climb takes you through purple sage and a remarkable serpentine wash. And although the trail gains about 2250 feet, it’s drawn out over 3.5 miles so it doesn’t seem too bad and with exponentially better views around each corner spurring you on, one seems to arrive at Alexander Saddle in almost no time. Never the less it is still a good workout.

Alexander Saddle

At Alexander Saddle the trail branches with one trail continuing uphill towards Little Pine and Happy Hollow and the other continuing down the backside towards Little Pine Spring, Santa Cruz Station and off into the San Rafael Wilderness.

The last .75 miles from the saddle to Little Pine Mountain follows the ridgeline, with one last trail branch that’s easy to miss just before Little Pine. The more obvious trail to the right arrives at Happy Hollow and the less used trail to the left takes you directly to Little Pine. The trail does make a little loop, but is easier to follow from Little Pine. 

At Little Pine Mountain one is rewarded with views of Lake Cachuma, the Santa Ynez Mountains and most of the Santa Barbara Channel Islands, as well as the San Rafael Mountains behind you.

This article originally appeared in Section A of the Friday, December 24, 2010 edition of the Santa Barbara News-Press

Lagniappe

I’ve been hiking the Santa Cruz Trail since my boy scout days, but this was my first time camping at Little Pine Spring. I’d hiked there on a day hike back in 2009, https://songsofthewilderness.com/2009/11/17/the-golden-hills-of-little-pine/, and was feeling called to go back there for a solo backpacking trip as a treat to myself, even though the article itself would be about day hiking to the top of Little Pine Mountain.

I got a late start on the hike but made it to camp before sunset. In spite of the amount uphill, the hike never seems to take that long. The trail down the backside over Little Pine is a little more overgrown than that coming up to Alexander Saddle. And the side trail down to Little Pine Spring is decidedly brushy, threading its way through dry wild mustard and the brush until one arrives at Little Pine Spring.

The camp itself is an oasis with the spring the only reliable source of water for several miles. And although it’s a small campsite it has a cozy feel. There’s one table and a fire ring of sorts made of orange metamorphic rocks. During the night I heard what sounded like a fox, although it could have easily been a mountain lion calling, and later heard an animal getting a drink from the spring in the middle of the night. In the morning, when I got up, I saw that a fox had left its calling card right by my tent, letting me know that this was its neighborhood, and I was just the visitor.

On the hike out, I made a side hike up to the top of Little Pine Mountain and over to Happy Hollow for the article. While hiking along the ridge towards Happy Hollow I spotted a dead bobcat under one of the pines. Seated, with its mouth open and covered in a layer of frost, looking like it probably died of old age. I could imagine this old bobcat, feeling its years, and settling in under the pine for the night, taking its last breath in the cold mountain air before passing to the other side.

Thinking a bobcat skull might make a nice addition to my collection I decided to bury it with the plan of coming back at some future date to retrieve the skull. I carefully placed a rock on it so an animal couldn’t just dig it up, but when I eventually returned the next year as part of a trail work project, I saw that an animal had managed to dig in from the side to get under the rock.