Palomar Mountain Stories
One of the finest trails in Palomar Mountain State Park is this loop with great surrounding views and interesting plants.
A tree-shaded trail with bucolic vistas leads to a world-class observatory.
Most visitors motor right up to the cool forests of Palomar Mountain’s parks or observatory on the curling South Grade or East Grade roads. Exercise-minded hikers might try an alternative east-side approach that actually reaches …
Fry Creek Campground, in the Cleveland National Forest on Palomar Mountain, offers the kind of forest camping experience that is becoming increasingly scarce in Southern California. A long-term drought cycle and various recent wildfires have …
Rattler ManJoseph Beresford, son of a British Lord, fell in love with the gardener’s daughter. His father, whose lineage went back to James I, gave him an ultimatum: marry beneath your rank and lose your …
In 1904, young Elise Roberts and her family summered on Palomar Mountain. They left their Long Beach home in a roofed wagon, half packed with clothes and bedding, the other half filled with hay for …
Mile-high Palomar Mountain State Park has probably the finest montane scenery in San Diego County, complete with trickling streams, mixed oak-conifer forests, and rolling meadows. So far, this magnificent spot has managed to evade the …
Palomar Mountain Observatory 35899 Canfield Road, Palomar 760-742-2119 Palomar, which means Pigeon Haven in La Jolla Indian dialect, is not an outing for those prone to carsickness. Once you exit I-15, curves are the norm. …
After a visit to Mount Palomar's famous observatory, I enjoy introducing friends to the delights of the natural landscape right below the telescope's looming dome. In a kind of reverse pilgrimage, we follow the Observatory …
The 21st Century journey up Palomar Mountain is perhaps too easy, notwithstanding the nauseatingly curvy South Grade Road that leads expeditiously to the top. With extra time, you can always revert to an earlier and …
Dear Matt: After 30 years as a San Diego resident, I finally visited the telescope on Palomar Mountain (man, that thing is HUGE). Anyway, as you enter the observatory grounds, there are all these signs …
After a wet winter, the shallow ponds in Love Valley hold the shimmering, upside-down image of a classic California landscape: a weathered barn nestled at the far end of an Ireland-colored meadow, rounded foothills studded …
The area we're hiking in burned last summer when Santa Ana winds blew a local man's trash fire into surrounding brush, scorching hundreds of acres. Now, the ground beneath us is black with soot.
The beautiful but sometimes hard-to-follow Fry Creek Trail circles the head of a densely wooded drainage on Palomar Mountain, reminding anyone on it (at least at this time of year) that vivid autumn colors really …
How's this for a challenging climb of Palomar Mountain from bottom to top? Start at Oak Grove, along the east base of the mountain, and climb steadily up 7 miles of foot trail and fire …