July 14, 2004
Los Padres National Forest
Lockwood Creek / Miller Jeep Trail
July 14, 2004 |
Los Padres National Forest Lockwood Creek / Miller Jeep Trail |
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| The sign on Lockwood Valley Road. GPS: 34.44.951N x 119.02.374W |
Keep going straight at the fork. GPS: 34.44.046N x 119.02.798W |
| Exit the 5 freeway at Frazier Park/Mt Pinos and head west for 7.1 miles. Turn left at Lockwood Valley Road and drive another 5.5 miles and you'll see the brown sign on the left indicating the Lockwood Creek Camp Grounds. You will stay on this dirt road all the way to the base of the trail. At about .7 miles you'll come to a fork - stay on the lower trail that runs straight ahead. | |
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| The West Frazier Mine Road sign. | The trail rises from left to right. |
| At 1.3 miles from the entrance you'll come to a 'T' intersection and Frazier Mine Road West, #118 (Dead End) is off to the left. You'll come to one more 'T' intersection at 2 miles from the street. Turning right you should see a trail going up the mountain in front of you. This is a good point to stop and air down. Go forward, cross the creek and veer left to the base of that trail. | |
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| Base of the trail going up. | Lockwood Trail sign GPS: 34.43.620N x 119.02.466W |
| Turn to the left after you cross the stream and you'll see the base of a trail headed up the mountain. Actually, this is merely an unimproved road according to the Forest Service map. There is a large rock on the right as you head uphill. It juts out like a bowsprit and has a nice gully drawing you into it. (There are good pictures of the rock on the last page of this section) Staying left, we breezed up the hill and into the forest toward the Lockwood Trail. | |
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| Kabob Hill. There is a bypass. | Picture doesn't show how bad it is. |
| There are some tougher segments of the trail, like Kabob Hill, that might be too much for a stock TJ. There is a bypass for Kabob, but there are some major rocky parts at the top of Alamo Mountain that you just have to navigate carefully. | |
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| The Rocky Trail. | A shallow Lockwood Creek. 34.42.067N x 119.59.980W |
| Its a long rocky trail that is anything but dull. It constantly turns back and forth winding its way up and over the mountain and down to Lockwood Creek. You'll cross the creek and go the right to find the next segment of the trail. | |
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| Rocky section of the trail. | The view backwards from 5800 feet. |
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After going up and down the hills a couple of times, you'll make your last ascent to the top of Alamo Mountain which is over 6000 feet. You will notice the terrain becomes much rockier. The pine trees give way to desert flora. The final part of the trail has some serious rocky ruts and boulders. This is where more clearance, skid plates and rock rails will be appreciated.
On my most recent trip up I ran into a group of Jeeps at the top of the trail that turned out to be the Bakersfield Trailblazers on a maintenance run cleaning up the trail. In their group was a brand new Rubicon that had made the climb. Fortunately, the one upgrade on the Rubicon was a set of rock rails. I could see the scrape marks on the driver's side where they did their job of protecting the Jeep from damage. |
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| The view from the top. | The campgrounds and forest. |
| There are some difficult spots on the way up. Even with a 4" lift I felt at least one rock hit the center. At the top of the trail, and the top of Alamo Mountain, there are lots of trees, places for tents, but you're out of trail. From here, you can drive on a dirt road down into Hungry Valley Steve Vehicle Recreation Area. You'll have to pay to exit Hungy Valley, or turn around and head back the way you came. | |
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