Roam
A cool coastal breeze, worming its way up through Mission Gorge, ruffles the mirrorlike surfaces of the seven Santee Lakes, and sets cottonwood leaves aflutter. A damp, wholly agreeable odor permeates the wooded shorelines. Does …
Far from sight and sound of the city, the Burkhart Trail blazes a lonely path over the desert bordering range of the San Gabriel Mountains and down into the upper margins of the Mojave Desert. …
San Diego County is riddled with edges or "ecotones" -- boundaries between different geographic regions or ecological habitats. Ecotones harbor great biological diversity and often feature spectacular scenery, especially when the transition from one type …
Prior to October 2003's great Cedar Fire, Cuyamaca Rancho State Park sprawled across more than 25,000 acres of chaparral, gentle meadows, gurgling streams, and forests of pines, firs, cedars, sycamores, and oaks. Today, of course, …
For much of the past century, Paramount Ranch has served the needs of an entertainment industry always hungry for rustic outdoor scenery. Since 1980, however, the core of this property has been in the hands …
Aside from North County's beaches, not many public spaces for anything resembling true "hiking" can be found in Oceanside or in neighboring Vista and Carlsbad. One significant exception is Gaujome Regional Park, an oasis of …
Chino Hills State Park spreads across some 13,000 acres of rolling, grassy hills of a sensuous, classically Californian nature. Down in the moist, hidden hollows between the swelling hills, live oak and California walnut trees …
You can explore two of San Diego's most beautiful old neighborhoods -- Mission Hills and Banker's Hill -- on the seven-mile, self-propelled tour outlined here. We'll define "self propelled" as walking, jogging, or bicycle riding. …
Angeles National Forest's Fall Creek Trail threads the steep, north wall of Big Tujunga Canyon and offers unique vistas of Big Tujunga's dramatic "Narrows" section below. Big Tujunga Canyon drains much of the western end …
Tecate Peak straddles the U.S./Mexico border, overlooking the twin towns of Tecate, California and Tecate, Baja California. Kumeyaay Indians called this peak "Kuchumaa," and believed that a holy power, for healing or harm, emanated from …
We're a month past the vernal equinox now. Vernal refers to the spring season, but it literally means "green." That color is likely to prevail over all others among the mile-high ridges and meadows of …
The 1655-acre Circle X Ranch, a unit of the sprawling, federally administered Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, is positively riddled with Tom Sawyer-esque hiking paths. Chief among those is the Grotto Trail, which leads …
With canyons and ravines numbering in the thousands or tens of thousands, the one-thousand-square-mile Anza-Borrego Desert State Park offers a lifetime of scenic exploration. Even the smaller canyons of the park offer a variety of …
For at least three decades, the Coal Canyon diamond interchange on the Riverside Freeway through Santa Ana Canyon was a virtual joke, featuring ramps to and from nowhere. "Nowhere" might have been replaced by subdivisions …
Strolling through the aptly named Valley of the Moon, you might think that a square-mile patch of Joshua Tree National Park has been magically transported there -- minus, of course, the famous Joshua trees. Ponderous …
The rural landscape spreading north and east of the tiny, border-hugging town of Campo is caught in a time warp. Not much new has appeared hereabouts in the past half-century. Narrow two-lane ribbons of blacktop …