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San Mateo Canyon Wilderness

The San Mateo Canyon Wilderness is located in the Santa Ana Mountains between Riverside and Orange Counties. Chaparral-covered hillsides, deep canyons, and huge sycamores and coast live oaks characterize the entire mountain range. The landscape is remarkably rugged. The single winding and twisted highway through the Santa Anas attracts hordes of motorists and hikers.

Far away from the hand of man, however, there is a curious evolutionary arms race playing out deep in the leaf litter and creek bottoms of San Mateo Canyon Wilderness. This story involves sordid sex and incredibly poisonous animals, and it’s one that surprised even me.

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Santa Rosa Wilderness

For centuries, the Cahuilla People used trails winding through the Santa Rosa Mountains to move in and out of California’s Coachella Valley; these mountains were their pathway to the west. They shared those foothills with the largest herd of peninsular bighorn sheep in the United States. Today the sheep move up and down the steep eastern flank of the Santa Rosas following the availability of food. The Santa Rosa Mountains are truly the home of ancient paths.

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South Fork San Jacinto Wilderness

In the foothills of the San Jacinto Mountains, the South Fork of the San Jacinto River slips along unnoticed next to the highway that most visitors zoom up to get to the popular mountain town of Idyllwild and the hiking destination of the San Jacinto Wilderness.  Ribbonwood and manzanita dominate the lower elevations in the San Jacintos and, admittedly, the South Fork of the San Jacinto River watershed (and the Wilderness that protects it) looks pretty unremarkable. However, I was reminded after several visits that sometimes the best gifts come wrapped in plain paper.

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