Our first hike in the San Gabriel Mountains.....big, steep and beautiful. My daughter Barbara, my brother Rob and I started our hike at the Vincent gap trail head with 9,399 foot Mount Baden Powell towering above us and 10,064 foot Mount Baldy across the way on the other side of the canyon. We set out to take the Mine Gulch trail out to the Buckhorn mine but about a mile down the trail we decided to traverse a rocky chute down into the East Fork San Gabriel River Canyon. We must have descended between 1000 to 1500 feet down into the canyon. what an experience hiking down on the loose scree and rock. From time to time the water would flow above ground intermittently as we made our way down. These are the very headwaters of what will eventually become a river miles downstream. Once we made it into the canyon we searched and found the switchbacking trail which led us back up to the trail head. We seen three deer on this hike. Once we were about a mile or two up the canyon we ran into a guy who gave us directions how to find Vincents Cabin, an old cabin way back in the woods built on a flat area overlooking the canyon. We checked out the cabin and then made our way back up to the car. Really cool hike. We then went down to the town of Wrightwood and ordered a large pizza and some drinks and played some good music on the jukebox as we filled our bellies out on the patio picnic area. Then we went and got some candy from the candy store to munch on on the drive home.
