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Hello Friends,

Lots of news to share from across the Los Padres, enough for two emails actually but lets start with an update from the LPFA Working Vacations. Thanks to help from over 30 volunteers, we just successfully wrapped up a 12-day volunteer Working Vacation along the Indian Canyon Trail in the Dick Smith Wilderness. Everyone had a great time, the food was terrific as always, the weather more or less cooperated, thankfully it wasn’t too hot and we got the trail dialed in up to Indian Canyon Camp! #knockeditout We’ll share more details within the next email but for now, we wanted to remind everyone of the next Working Vacation coming up in a couple weeks along the Red Reef Trail……

RED REEF – LADYBUG WORKING VACATION
April 23 – May 1
Come one, come all and join us later this month as we work to restore the spectacular Red Reef Trail within the Sespe Wilderness. The project will kick-off on Saturday April 23 with volunteers driving up from Rose Valley along the Nordhoff Ridge 4WD Road to the upper Red Reef Trailhead. Once at the trailhead we’ll backpack 5 miles across and down to Ladybug Camp, which will be our home for the 10-day Working Vacation. We’ll once again have stock support bringing in most of the food, tools, supplies and cold drinks for the project. The focus of the work will be brushing and tread work along approximately 2.5 miles of the Red Reef Trail from Ladybug down towards Sespe Creek. Ladybug is set within a grove of shaded fir trees just below 5,000ft and has reliable water with enough space to find some privacy and move around. While we’d love to have you for the entire time, there will be many shorter options for people to come and go as their schedule allows. This promises to be a great time spent with like-minded friends along one of the more epic Los Padres trails. Please email with questions or to sign up. We could use help with trail workers, cooks and shuttle drivers. Hope you can make it!
VOLUNTEER@LPForest.org

What is a Working Vacation?

Working Vacations are larger scale volunteer trail maintenance projects that the LPFA organizes in support of the Los Padres National Forest. Working Vacations are generally focused on maintaining harder-to-get-to trails and they usually range from 7-10 days in length.

The LPFA provides all the food for the Working Vacations and we normally have stock support bring in food, gear and supplies with a dedicated cook on hand to ensure everyone eats well throughout their stay. While we’d love to have everyone volunteer for all 7-10 days, we realize that life doesn’t usually allow us to be away for that long and we always have shorter options available as well. We do ask that everyone commit at least 3 days for the project.

The usual Working Vacation day starts off with sunrise coffee followed by breakfast. We then we pack our lunches and hit the trail by 8am. We work throughout the day or until we’re tired and return to camp for a cold drink, dinner and ideally some story-telling, songs and laughter around the campfire before heading off to bed.

The flow of Working Vacations is very soothing and somewhat addictive, most people who come on a Working Vacation end up signing up for the next one as well. The Working Vacations are a lot of fun and a truly rewarding wilderness experience. That’s the sales pitch, in case the opportunity to spend time in the forest wasn’t enough of a pull all by itself.

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WELCOME BACK NIRA
After being closed for nearly 9 months, the Forest Service successfully reopened Sunset Valley Road a day ahead of schedule on March 31. The extended closure was needed to complete construction of two new bridges along Sunset Valley Road which are designed to improve fish passage within the the Fir, Manzana and Sisquoc drainages. The bridges were welcomed as part of a ribbon cutting ceremony held on March 30. The road reopening once again means the public can access Davy Brown and NIRA Campgrounds in addition to both Manzana trailheads, which is certainly reason for many people to celebrate. While the bridges look fantastic, the trails out of NIRA might be a little rough after having 9 months of limited foot and hoof traffic. If you happen to explore the trails out of NIRA and come across anything that could be repaired, please let us know or post to HikeLosPadres.com and we’ll do our best to get it fixed up as soon as we can. Enjoy everyone and take it slow……

Hello Friends,

It sure seemed impossible that we’d be where we are after the December deluge but sure enough we’re staring directly into another drought year. California just endured our driest January and February in recorded history and even after the phenomenal 2021 Holiday storms we’re currently around 55-60% of normal total rain percentage for the year. {insert profanities as needed} Even with the recent lack of substantial rain the Los Padres remains in ideal spring mode at the moment, we’re just not sure how long this moment will last….. With that in mind, we’ve decided to pivot some of our volunteer projects in order to ensure we have enough creek water for the Working Vacations. 

First, a little background: what is a Working Vacation? Working Vacations are larger scale volunteer trail maintenance projects that the LPFA organizes with the support of the Los Padres National Forest. Working Vacations are generally focused on maintaining harder-to-get-to trails which require a larger time commitment. We usually host Working Vacations for 7-10 days which allow us to accomplish miles of really solid trail work. The LPFA provides all the food for the Working Vacations and we normally have stock support bring in food, gear and supplies with a dedicated cook on-hand to make sure everyone is fed good food throughout their stay. While we’d love to have everyone volunteer for all 7-10 days, we realize that life doesn’t usually allow us to be away for that long and we always have shorter options available for people as well. We do ask that everyone who signs up commit at least 3 days towards the project. The usual day starts off with sunrise coffee followed by breakfast then we pack our lunches and hit the trail by 8am. We work throughout the day or until we’re tired and return to camp for a cold drink, dinner and ideally some story telling and laughter around the campfire before heading off to bed. The flow of Working Vacations is very soothing and somewhat addictive, most people who come on a Working Vacation end up signing up for the next one as well. The Working Vacations are a lot of fun and a truly rewarding wilderness experience. That’s the sales pitch, in case the opportunity to spend time in the forest wasn’t enough of a pull all by itself. 

The LPFA has two Working Vacations scheduled for spring 2022, see details below and we hope you can make it to one or both. Please email us with any questions or to sign up. We are currently looking for cook help and could also use some help camp sitting, truck shuttling and of course helping maintain these incredible trails…..

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INDIAN CREEK WORKING VACATION: March 26 – April 3
We’ll be working to restore the Indian Creek Trail within the Dick Smith Wilderness between Meadow Camp and Indian Creek Camp. Volunteers will be able to drive to the Indian-Mono Trailhead and from there it’s a 6 mile backpack out to our basecamp at Meadow Camp. Indian Creek is a special spot which has suffered of late due to lack of access and the trail hasn’t been maintained since before the 2007 Zaca Fire. This will be a fantastic opportunity to get back out there and ensure the trail remains open for years to come. Email us VOLUNTEER@LPForest.org to sign up or with questions or you can check our Facebook Event posting for more details as well.

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RED REEF – LADY BUG WORKING VACATION: April 23 – May 1
The Red Reef is another classic LP trail which hasn’t seen much dedicated maintenance in quite some time. We’ve been chipping away at Red Reef over the past year and have most of it cleared and in good shape expect for about 2.5 miles directly below Lady Bug Camp within the Sespe Wilderness. The Working Vacation will be based at Lady Bug and we’ll be focused on reopening the final couple miles of trail. We’ll be able to drive up from Rose Valley to the base of Topatopa Bluff which will leave us about 5 miles of trail to backpack out to Lady Bug. Stock will be bringing in all the food, gear and supplies – should be a great project and we hope you can join us. Email us VOLUNTEER@LPForest.org to sign up or with questions or you can check our Facebook Event posting for more details as well.

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The Bridges of Sunset Valley – NIRA remains closed but remains on target to reopen Friday April 1. Click here if you’d like information about alternative backcountry locations to check out while NIRA is closed in order to minimize overcrowding at the usual suspects. Photo South Coast Creek Habitat Restoration

VWR TRAINING POSTPONED
After consulting with the Forest Service and due to COVID, the Volunteer Wilderness Ranger Training will be postponed until the fall. 
Stay tuned for more updates as they become available….

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Hello Friends,

We hope this email finds you in a nice comfortable place, with some sore trail legs and a smile on your face! January has certainly been interesting here in the Los Padres between volcanic tsunami warnings and a rare January wildfire. Never a dull moment, and that’s not even mentioning the ghosted backcountry plane…. While we had a tremendous run of storms over the holidays, January has unfortunately been a bit of a precipitation dud up to this point with no additional storms in the forecast. Most of the Los Padres remains just above the normal percentage of rainfall to date but we’re still quite a long way from reaching our normal water year totals. We need more rain. That being said, the forest is spectacular at the moment with lots of green and plenty of water flowing through most of the creeks, rivers and waterfalls. Lets collectively keep our fingers crossed for lots more gentle rain in the near future. Until then, we should all be taking advantage of the clear skies and finding as much trail time as we can. As always, HikeLosPadres.com is a terrific resource for checking trail conditions and of course reporting back what you find. There’slots more forest information and updates in the email below…. Enjoy and please let us know if we can help with anything or if you have any Los Padres questions……..

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LPFA UPDATE

We’ve been busy! You may be familiar with the saying about making hay when the sun shines, for us if it’s not raining in January we are out there. Here’s a quick update of what the LPFA Trail Crew and our terrific volunteers have been up to across the Los Padres:

• We just wrapped up three weeks of work along the Red Reef Trail in the Sespe Wilderness working from the Sespe Creek side up towards Ladybug Camp. Over that time we brushed out approximately 3 miles of really overgrown trail up past Horsethief. This was a combination of volunteers along with the LPFA Trail Crew. Huge thanks to our volunteer packers Emma and Joe for fueling the effort. We’ll be back soon, continuing work from both sides with the goal of completing the Red Reef Trail by early May!

• As always, we are open for business to help provide answers and information for forest users. Both Big Sur Station and Wheeler Gorge Visitor Centerhave been open and are helping people enjoy their time in the Los Padres. If you’re ever in the Hwy 33 or Hwy 1 neighborhoods, stop by and say hello to Tim, Andres, Peter, Gordie, Kasey and Terry. Then be sure to ask them a really hard question, make em sweat a bit…. You can always reach us with forest questions at INFO@LPForest.org as well. We are also always looking for volunteers to help at the Visitor Centers, please email if interested or with questions….

• Another trail in our cross-hairs this year is the Sweet Water Trail, which connects the Sierra Madre down to the Sisquoc River within the San Rafael Wilderness. The LPFA Trail Crew was out there last week starting to chip away at the brushing and there will be some volunteer opportunities for runners soon helping to bring water out along the trail as well. If you are a runner, like to camp and would like to help, please let us know. 

• On the other side of the San Rafael, the LPFA Trail Crew are out this week putting the finishing touches on brushing out the Sulphur Spring Trail coming off of Zaca Ridge and dropping into the Lower Manzana. We’ve been hacking away at this trail for the past year or more and doing our best to avoid the poison oak in the process.

• We’ve also been busy working on all the Figueroa Mountain Trails focusing again on brushing and clearing downed trees. If you’re interested, we’ve got a few volunteer days on the schedule below and would love to help organize a larger volunteer team-building day for your group, company or organization. Let us know…..

• The best volunteers ever have stayed busy keeping trails open and clearing downed trees, slides and brush where needed on many of the frontcountry and midcountry trails including Cold Spring north, Blue Canyon, Franklin north, Tequepis, Horn Canyon, Red Reef, Santa Cruz, Arroyo Burro, Romero north, Big Falls and more…. Thanks everyone!

• Volunteers have also been busy working on the far southern side of the Sespe with trail days focused on the Agua Blanca, an upcoming reroute of the Pothole Trail and scouting for future projects working from Dough Flat to Sespe Hot Springs. Good stuff ahead down along the lower Sespe.

• Lastly, we’re gearing up for some continued work along the lower Buckhorn Trail in advance of our May 2022 Working Vacation on Indian Creek. The Working Vacation will be focused on clearing the Indian Creek Trail from Meadow Camp up to Indian Canyon Camp, aka Indian Creek Camp. This is something we’ve been wanting to do for many many years. Stay tuned for more information or you can always sign up now by emailing Volunteer@LPForest.org.

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FOREST 411

• The biggest news around the Los Padres has certainly been the Colorado Fire, which burned approximately 700 acres north of Big Sur this past weekend. The cause of the fire was released earlier this week and fortunately it was quickly contained. Fires in January?

• The other biggest news was the apparent staged plane crash along the Sisquoc. If you haven’t seen this video, buckle up (pun intended) and prepare for the rabbit hole. You can watch hours and hours of commentary videos dissecting each of the pilots choices and there will be more coming as the FAA investigation takes shape. The fortunate news is that the crash didn’t ignite a fire and we’ve heard that the wreckage has been removed. We’ll keep you posted on future developments……

• Campfires are currently permitted across the Los Padres with a California Campfire Permit. Check here for more information from the Forest Service. Be safe and always extinguish your campfire.

• You may remember the video from fall 2020 of the mountain lion standoff in Utah, well, here is a shorter cougar charge also caught on film from just outside the Los Padres.

• The Forest Service has released an additional report regarding the entrapment and burnover during the 2020 Dolan Fire.

• Good news shared this week as some much needed money will be invested to rebuild and repair the Nacimiento-Fergusson Road which was severely damaged as a result of the Dolan Fire. The road remains closed but should reopen by the start of 2024.

• No new news to share on the Reyes Peak (Pine Mountain) Fuels Reduction Project but here’s an article from the Guardian which does a good job of sharing multiple sides of the debate. 

• It was announced late last year that the Tepusquet area outside of Santa Maria will be getting a fire prevention related haircut in order to help protect the area. 

• The Los Padres NF is looking to fill a temporary Recreation Office position on the Ojai and SB Ranger Districts. Click here for details….

• Sunset Valley Road and paved access to NIRA remains closed due to bridge construction. The project is on schedule to be completed by the end of March. Dan McCaslin recently wrote an article featuring some photos of the under construction bridges. Check it out….

• The Forest Service will be overseeing a few piling and burning operations here and there across the forest, most notably up at Figueroa Mountain. More details and updates will be shared on social media……

• The Los Padres NF has some new Campground Occupancy Use regulations which limit the amount of time people can camp at certain locations, check here for the Forest Order.

• Our great friend and recent Condor Trail Guide author Brian Sarvis was recently featured on the Road Dog Podcast hosted by Luis Escobar. If you are thinking about the Condor Trail, be sure to pick up Brian’s book and check out the podcast.

• Speaking of condors, while our favorite feathered friends continue a remarkable multi-decade recovery, it’s not all rainbows and puppies. Recent reports indicate that lead poisoning remains a threat and cause of death for condors. For more information or to help out, reach out to the Ventana Wildlife Society or the Friends of California Condors.

• Last but not least we wanted to wish a fond farewell to Diane Cross, who retired at the end of 2021 after 38 years with the Forest Service. Diane served a lot of roles over her decades of work but is mostly known for her contributions to recreation within the Ojai Ranger District. We’ll share some more information on Diane in the coming weeks but wanted to thank her for all her help and wish her the best of luck on her forthcoming stanzas. And of course, she has a lifetime invite to attend any upcoming Working Vacation (hint hint DC).

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UPCOMING EVENTS

January 28-30: Pine Ridge Trail Work, VWA
January 29: Agua Blanca Trail Work

February 9: Hwy 33 Adopt-A-Highway, LPFA
February 10: Horn Canyon Ojai Trail Work, LPFA
February 17: LPFA Backcountry Presentation, SB Library
February 18: Figueroa Mountain Trail Work, LPFA
February 19-21: Pine Ridge Trail Work, VWA

March 9: Hwy 33 Adopt-A-Highway, LPFA
March 26 – April 3: Alder Creek Working Vacation, Sespe, LPFA

April 7: Tour de Los Padres Bike Event
April 22 – May 2: Red Reef Working Vacation – Ladybug Camp, LPFA

May 14-23: Indian Creek Working Vacation – Meadow Camp, LPFA

October 2022: Volunteer Wilderness Ranger Training
November 5-13, 2022: South Fork Working Vacation – San Rafael Wilderness, LPFA

Los Padres Forest Association
HikeLosPadres.com
Facebook.com/LPFA
Instagram/LPFA

Hello Friends,

We’ve got lots of news from across the Los Padres down below but first off we wanted to share a couple incredible announcements that the trail users among us will certainly be excited to hear:

FIGUEROA MOUNTAIN TRAIL WORK
Thanks to a Public Trails Grant from the Santa Barbra Foundation and some generous donations from the Santa Ynez Valley Women’s Hiking Group, the LPFA will be restoring over a dozen miles of trail this season along the backside of Figueroa Mountain. This will include all the trails between White Rock and Willow Spring with most of the work focused on clearing brush and downed trees from the trail corridor. In order to help complete the trail work we’ll be scheduling regular Fig Mtn volunteer projects starting with our first one on Friday November 19. We’ll be sharing volunteer opportunities through the regular channels and would love to setup a corporate or special volunteer project should any of your companies or organizations be interested in helping with these trails – let us know. These trails are long overdue for a nice haircut and we can’t wait to get started. We hope you can join us in this ambitious effort…..

RED REEF TRAIL WORK
The Red Reef Trail is hands down one of the most spectacular trails in the Los Padres. Red Reef extends 13 miles from its Upper Ojai Valley southern trailhead over the Topatopas and into the rugged canyons of the Sespe Wilderness before terminating at the junction with the Sespe River Trail. Red Reef is a terrific trail and has a little bit of everything for just about every type of forest user. Unfortunately it’s also got quite a bit of trail damage resulting from both the Thomas Fire as well as deferred maintenance. The great news is that the Los Padres National Forest secured funding from the Great American Outdoors Act (GAOA) and the LPFA will be helping over the coming months to restore and maintain all 13 miles of the Red Reef Trail. We are stoked, to say the least. We’ll be starting work on the Red Reef this weekend while hosting an Ojai First Saturday Trail Project starting at 8am on November 13. We’ll also be hosting a 5-day project in January working from the Sespe up towards an area known as Horsethief. We’ll have quite a few other volunteer projects lined up over the coming months as well. This is so exciting and we sure look forward to many of you helping bring this gem of a trail back to life.

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FOREST 411

• Even with the generous early season rains, we’ve been hearing a lot of reports of continued dry conditions from across the Los Padres. It seems that Mother Earth drank up most of the precipitation so far and that the creeks, streams and rivers haven’t been activated yet. Keep this in mind as you pull on your backpack and head out to the forest. Even with the rain, water might still be scarce in spots. As always, it’s never a bad idea to check HikeLosPadres before you venture out and be sure to share what you find after you get back. Safe travels…..

• Quick reminder that the Los Padres remains in fire restrictions and campfires are currently not allowed anywhere across the forest.

• There remains a closure order in place for the Alisal Fire, which burned 16,970 acres across the western Santa Ynez Mountains in October. The forest remains closed through November 19th from Winchester Gun Club out through Gaviota Peak, this includes the Tequepis Trail and the dirt portions of West Camino Cielo.

• In addition to the Alisal Fire, both the 2021 Willow Fire and 2020 Dolan Fire still have active forest closures. Click the links to the left for more information.

• Another quick reminder that Fremont, Paradise and Los Prietos Campgrounds remain closed along Paradise Road due to hazard tree removal.

• Remember too that Sunset Valley Road and paved access to both Davy Brown and NIRA Campgrounds remains closed through March 2022. Some good news, the LPFA Trail Crew has been working to clear the nearby Sulphur Spring Trail, which will help provide some better access this season for the Manzana and Sisquoc. We’re also encouraging the Forest Service to keep vehicle access to other trailheads open this season as many backpackers are being displaced due to the Manzana closure. More on that to come…

• Some condor news, three condors were released earlier this month into the wild in the mountains above San Simeon. We’ll be watching these three closely, especially #38!

• The Forest Service signed a Decision Memo on September 30 to move forward with the Reyes Peak Forest Health and Fuels Reduction proposal along Pine Mountain within the Ventura Backcountry. You can read more about the controversial proposal here.

• In other Los Padres news, we want to wish a fond farewell to former Supervisor Kevin Elliott, who recently retired after 43 years with the Forest Service and the last 3 on the Los Padres. Taking over as interim Supervisor for at least the next four months will be Chris Stubbs. Chris has been the Deputy Supervisor for a few years now and has a great feel for the Los Padres Forest. Welcome aboard Chris, we look forward to working with you.

• We also want to officially welcome Daryl Hodges as the new Santa Barbara District Ranger.  

• Our friends at the Pack Stock Center of Excellence are seeking packing apprentices for the 2022 summer season. You can apply here, here and here. Good luck and make sure they continue visiting the Los Padres as well….

• Our great friends at the Los Padres NF are also looking to hire seasonal help at their Santa Maria, Santa Barbara and Frazier Park district offices – check it out here… The LPNF is also looking to hire for a permanent Admin Assistant for the Santa Barbara Ranger District, click here.

• Remember that we are still accepting calendar submission for the 2022 Los Padres Calendar. If you’ve got a great photo or 50 from the Los Padres, please send em our way and we’ll send you a calendar if we use your photo. INFO@LPForest.org – thanks in advance!

• Last but not least, we want to say thank and good luck to our beloved friend Kendra Moss. Kendra was the LPFA Program Manager for the past couple years and had an opportunity come up that was too good to pass up. We really miss Kendra and appreciate all that she did for the LPFA and all the help she provided for the Los Padres Forest. Exciting times ahead for Kendra and she did a great job setting the LPFA up for success as well. Cheers KM!

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UPCOMING EVENTS
A few upcoming dates, events, projects, presentations or things you might want to know. If you have any forest-related events to add to this list, let us know and we’re more than happy to pass along!

November 13: First Saturday Ojai – Red Reef Trail, LPFA
November 13-14: Little Pine Trailwork, LPFA
November 18: Beauty of Chumash Basketry, SB Library Talk
November 19: Figueroa Mountain Trail Work, LPFA
November 20-21: Lower Santa Ynez Sign Install, LPFA
November 23: Trailwork Tuesday – Buena Vista Trail, MTF & LPFA

December 5: Santa Margarita Lake, CCCMB
December 2-6: Tamarisk Removal – Sisquoc, CIR

January 6-10: Red Reef Trail – Sespe Creek, LPFA
January 15: LPFA Member/Volunteer PARTY!
January 22: West Cuesta Trail Work, CCCMB

February 5: Volunteer Wilderness Ranger Training

March – April: Fundamentals of Backpacking Course, LPFA
March 26 – April 3: Alder Creek Working Vacation – Sespe, LPFA
April 22 – May 2: Red Reef Working Vacation – Ladybug Camp, LPFA
May 14-23: Indian Creek Working Vacation – Meadow Camp, LPFA
November 5-13, 2022: South Fork Working Vacation – San Rafael Wilderness, LPFA

  

Los Padres Forest Association
HikeLosPadres.com
Facebook.com/LPFA
Instagram/LPFA