Two-Heel Drive

Yesterday we were walking back to the car, admiring our certificates for completing the 2008 El Toro Hike of Morgan Hill, when Rebecca noted the 1,420-foot elevation and said “hey, all you’d have to do is add one digit and you’d have an actual mountain, like 14,200.” At that point a couple of us sort of chimed in “hey, it’s a Fourteener!”

We got a chuckle out of that, which inspired me to tap out The Fourteener of Morgan Hill, spoofing the heavy-breathing style of adventure magazine article writing. The hike itself wasn’t exactly spoofworthy: the local Historical Society organized it and very nice, friendly people got up early on a Saturday morning, put out hot coffee and cupcakes, sold a few T-shirts to benefit the society and sent several hundred of us on our way up the hill. Local Boy Scouts put up ropes to help get us up and down the really steep parts. Dissing such public-spirited activities practically begs the forces of Karma to supply a flat tire in the middle of the Mojave when the spare is flat and the cellphone battery has just gone dead.

(Getting straight to the point is for sissies and newsmen on the clock, OK?)

So, bullet points from the hike, if you missed it this year and might go next:

• It’s over way too soon. It’s only a mile and a half to the top; you can do the whole thing in two hours and have plenty of time to soak up the view from on top.
• It’s really steep for that last quarter-mile, and it’s harder than you might suspect. I burned too much energy at the beginning trying to keep up with David, Rebecca and Russ, then had to give up, then had to keep up with the general pace of people around me on the steep steps near the top, then finally had to step aside, plop my fanny in the dirt and rest up for five minutes while I caught my breath.
• There’s lots of poison oak along the narrow part on the way up.
• Getting back down is trickier than getting up. Don’t imagine you can just trot back down that slope, it’s more like picking your way down, holding onto the rope and hoping for the best. Shoe with lots of tread are recommended.
• It’s not a hike in the classic sense. It’s a communal gathering, sort of a county fair that happens to be going up a very steep hill. The view from the El Toro Summit is nice, but if you’ve hiked six times in the Bay Area you’ve probably seen five panoramic vistas of equal or better quality. It’s a mass of humanity, which we hike to get away from most of the time.
• It’s just difficult enough to give everybody a shared sense of accomplishment, creating a “we’re all in this together” vibe that people manage to get when they come together to cope with the complications life throws at us. Like Midwesterners digging out after a blizzard.

Worth doing again? Sure. Originally, the only thing I cared about was crossing that peak off my life list, but now it just seems like a cool way to kill a few hours on a Saturday morning in the springtime with a bunch of people out having a good time. Hard to pick any nits with that.

(Calipidder’s pictures here).

(David’s pictures here, write-up here … his house is apparently right on the route, next year it’s beers at his place! )

(Ann’s pictures here; review at Yelp.com here. )

(Wine Hiker Russ’s write-up here)

(A first ascent, as it might have appeared in an adventure rag of your choosing).

One day a year, they open the path to El Toro. Straight up the spine of the signature peak that glowers at the edge of Morgan Hill, California, a bedroom community where Silicon Valley techies rest from their hard-coding duties.
I’m at the Morgan Hill Library with one Russ Beebe, a trekker, a wine taster, an adventurer, a man who once pulled his head from the jaws of a Yosemite black bear. He laughs about the bear but he’s not laughing about the Bull. He’s hiked every trail in Northern California a half-dozen times, but one has escaped him till today — the harrowing mile and a half to the 1,420.3-foot peak of El Toro. It’s Summit Day and he’s all business.

We find our climbing companions from the crowd milling about at the library lot — David, who cuts his firewood with a knife because it’s lighter than an ax, and his wife, Rebecca, who haunts canyons across the Southwest and proudly Twitters her conquests via Blackberry to her deskbound pals back in the Valley.

From the crowd emerges Ann, one of my hiking blog’s 1.2 million readers, whose tanned face tells the story of the miles she’s logged in these hills. She smiles, introduces me to her friends, disappears into the crowd to register for the rigors to come.

Russ, never far from his Camelback Hydration System, assesses the crowd. Most of them have no business on a mountain of this magnitude, he suspects.

David and Rebecca sign the register, leaving word of who gets their closetful of backpacking gear if things go badly.

The mountain awaits.

Our cheerful hostess reminds us to watch out for poison oak. “If you get lost, just follow somebody.” I scribble her advice in my notepad. You never know when it might come in handy.

The crowd psyches itself up for the adventure ahead.

Rocks of 150 million years’ vintage are not to be trifled with, a local geologist tells us.

Finally, we’re on our way. Through a neighborhood barely rising from its slumbers, and onto the peak’s base.

The first dirt appears about 15 minutes into the trek.

Climbers have waited a year to take in a panoramic view unavailable anywhere else, save here.

A rare shade tree … the fates have smiled upon us and provided an overcast morning, shielding us from the sun’s blistering rays.

And now, straight up the face of El Toro.

Scouts have been here ahead of us to dig these steps in the hillside.

I pause and rest along the trail, shielding my fellow trekkers from the tendrils of a poison oak bush. Russ, Rebecca and Dave have long since hiked ahead and are already celebrating at the peak. I’m fighting to keep my breath, my heart’s racing. I have to make it to the top, though, because I bought one of those “I Hiked the Peak” T-shirts before the peak had actually been hiked. I could never my show my face on trails in these parts if I failed. The shame would be too great.

Scrambling, clinging to ropes installed by the Boy Scouts (man, those kids know their knots!), they make their way upward.

Oh, to have four paws about now.

At last, the summit. All of Northern California is sprawled out before us. Nine hundred and ninety-eight feet of vertical ascent in a mile and a half. Our shared sensation of victory is palpable.

Rebecca, triumphant, trained for this moment for months.

The couple share a tender moment, as Russ digs deep into his pack in search of a bottle of Pinot he usually stashes for such moments. Left it on Denali. Damn.

Rare, exotic species of wildflowers found only in this corner of the world dot the hillsides.

Beyond, the peaks of the beguiling Santa Cruz Range beckon.

Dave, left, another blog reader, compares notes with the other Dave. Both agree the climb reminds them of the time they made a hammock from the hides of rattlesnakes they’d killed with their bare hands because weapons were not sporting. Russ recommended a red that pairs well with pan-seared rattlesnake flesh.

Dave and Ann recall the time they barely got out of Borneo with the clothes on their backs and 10 cents to hail a pedi-cab back to civilization.

Poison Oak, scourge of the El Toro ascent.

A Scout calmly mans his post.

And now, back the way we came. Ahead, a young child will have the experience of a lifetime, perfect preparation for a lifetime in therapy.

One last look at the climbers making their way skyward.

Rebecca accepts her certificate confirming the ascent. Another fourteener for her life list.

El Toro taunts us a second time.

(Calipidder’s pictures here).

(David’s pictures here.)

(Ann’s pictures here.)

(Wine Hiker Russ’s write-up here)

It’s where all the cool kid are going to be.

Morgan Hill Historical Society has one hike planned — at 8 a.m. Saturday, April 5. Sign-up is at 7:45 a.m. at the Morgan Hill Library, 660 W. Main Ave., Morgan Hill. (Note, I had this wrong initially; google’s map was out of date). Easy to find if you’re a Henry Coe regular: take the same Dunne Avenue exit from Highway 101, but head west instead of east. Go 1.3 miles to Peak Avenue, take a right and go .3 mile to Main, turn left and go .1 mile to the library. Google Maps says it’s 37 minutes driving time from my place on North First Street near Highway 237. This is the correct version:

View Larger Map

My previous post on the hike, with some links and background, is here

Props to Ann for for the update.

Alert reader Arlene asked if I knew anything about the El Toro hike in Morgan Hill. Being the go-to guy on all trail-related matters in these parts, I had no idea what she was talking about. But I did some googling and got it straight.

Turns out that cone-like mound you always see on the way to Henry Coe is not the “Morgan Hill” after which the town is named. It’s actually called El Toro, because the first guy to climb to the top of it got chased off by a bull, the story goes.

Also turns out that the hill is on private property, but the landowner allows one hike to the top every spring, usually in April. Rick of Hike Half Dome fame wrote it up last year.

This year’s hike is again in April, but the date hasn’t been finalized. It will be announced at this page (or perhaps this one) kept by the Morgan Hill Historical Society. Judging from the pictures, it’s not a trivial trek: the trail goes pretty much straight up the hillside (switchbacks are for babies, I always say).

I asked a nice woman at the historical society if reservations were required; she said nope.

I may just try to squeeze this one in. It drives me nuts seeing that hill over there and knowing I haven’t been to the top of it.