Reyes Peak, Haddock Mountain, Lockwood Point

	     Reyes Peak, Haddock Mountain, Lockwood Point
			 Leader: George Wysup
			  18 September 2001

Sandy Burnside is allegedly interested in kinder gentler trails while
her ankle is on the mend.  I remembered Haddock as being a gently
undulating trail hike through a pleasant forest, eventually taking one
to a peak reminiscent of the Grand Canyon.  (If the notion of a
canyon-like peak causes cognitive dissonance, all I can suggest is
that you go there, and then you'll understand.)  So I proposed we hike
Haddock.  But Reyes is right there, so how could we skip Reyes?
Eventually, there was a plan: Reyes Peak, Haddock Mountain, and
Lockwood Point.  And a cast of hikers: Sandy Burnside, Karen Leverich,
George Wysup, and Ron Zappen.  Definitely the recipe for a fun day in
the mountains.

When Brian and I did these peaks earlier this year, we did Reyes one
day and Haddock the next.  I know, I know, they're usually combined
into a single hike, it just worked out that way.  (Oddly enough, we
met the same group of hikers returning from Haddock on the 2nd day
that we'd met returning from Reyes the previous day, so we weren't the
only hikers to do the two peaks in that oddball manner.)  The point,
such as it is, is that I had no clue what the Reyes to Haddock
shortcut was like, and whether it would agree with Sandy's ankle.
Silly me!  Read on!  This is definitely not a tale of a mollycoddled
ankle.

At the trailhead, cosily camped under a "no camping" sign, was a young
man.  "How long will you be gone?  I can watch your car!"  Er, right,
thanks anyhow?  But given how we were equipped, it seemed pointless to
pretend we'd be gone only a few minutes, so we confessed to a planned
absence of a few hours, and headed off for Reyes Peak.

What a difference a few months of hiking can make!  Although still on
the steep side, the trail seemed shorter and no longer required
periodic rest breaks.  We were atop the rocky summit in no time,
savoring the views, waiting patiently while Sandy negotiated the last
rocky bits.

On to Haddock.  I'm not sure if the shortcut is wildly serpentine, or
if we indulged in a bit of unorthodox pathfinding.  After some
seemingly unfocused cross country wanderings, we eventually ended up
on a ridgeline complete with use trail, which led us easily eastward
to the trail.

The climbing guide indicates Haddock to be a modest 600' gain.  Dunno
how they came up with that, maybe by subtracting the elevation of the
trail head from the elevation of the peak?  The reality is that the
trail goes up and down and up and down and up and .... well, you get
the notion.  I think when all was said and done, the gain was more
like 1500'?  With spectacular views along the way of Potrero John
Canyon.

We took a long break on the summit, enjoying our lunch, and bartering
"helicopters" (pine seeds) for some of Sandy's brownies.  The
helicopters will be shared with Oceanside children, who think all
trees look like palm trees, or something.

On the way out, we ran into the young camper, pushing a bicycle along
the trail.  "Is this a Wilderness Area?" he asked disingenuously.  "Are
bicycles OK?"  We had no clue, not having seen a Wilderness Area sign,
so shrugged and went on our way.  Seemingly around the next bend, we
came across the back of the "Entering the Wilderness" sign that our
bicycling friend had surely just seen.  Oh well!  At least he'd not
looted the car in our absence, and a single bicycle in the wilderness
probably didn't damage the trail that much.  One hopes?

I had worried about the cross country and Sandy's ankle, so had been a
bit taken aback to learn that, Reyes and Haddock being too short to
adequately fill a hiking day, Ron had proposed we add in Lockwood Point,
which he needed for his next list finish.  "What about that rocky
gully?"  "Oh, it's not so bad, and there's a good use trail."

So there is, assuming you choose the right gully.  With landmarks like
"after the nth meadow" (was that one meadow or two we just passed?)
and "just past mile paddle 2" (but is it still there? sure seems like
we've gone two miles, and that gully there looks familiar...), is it
any wonder we were (briefly) fooled and lured into the wrong gully?

Recovered from our useless detour, we headed further east along the
unpleasantly named Yellow Jacket Trail, eventually passing mile paddle
2 (still there after all), finding a promising duck, and (hurrah!) a
gully with a well-defined use trail.

The statistics for Lockwood Point don't sound so bad: 5 1/2 miles,
1500' elevation gain.  What they don't tell you is that most of those
miles are more or less level, with the gain all packed into the last
fraction of a mile, a steep ascent up a rocky gully.  Surely not what
Sandy's doctor had in mind, but she took it very carefully, and
eventually we were atop the ridge, working through the maze in the
brush to the less than descript summit.  Not the most popular peak on
the list -- other than the scheduled HPS hike the previous weekend,
the only visitors so far in 2001 had been Brian and myself last June.
Not the most pleasant peak on the list, either, but one of the few in
my backyard, so I suppose I should be somehow chauvinistic and extol
its charms.  Let me think...