Seeking the Lost

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A man I know used good sense when hiked to Warren View in September.  Weather is usually good then, and severe heat is not a problem.  I used bad sense—hiking in July when summer is almost always very hot, and then finding myself positioned for the hike in a stretch of extreme heat.  I proceeded anyway, starting at first light, pushing hard to summit early, and be out by noon.  

Black Rock Spring

I started at Black Rock Campground near the western edge of Joshua Tree Park.  I hiked up Black Rock Canyon, the route Ed Rosenthal hiked in September of 2010.  It’s an easy walk in the early morning, with a spring part way up, nourishing trees bushes and bees.  Black Rock Spring was dry, but the trees know a deeper source.

I turned right where two dry washes join, and right again where two dry washes join.  You can follow these cryptic directions on the three maps shown here, if you happen to care as much about maps as I do. 

Anyway, Ed Rosenthal and I turned left at the next fork, and hiked to Warren View. 

Mount San Gorgonio

Mount San Jacinto

From this high point, we looked far to the west to Mount San Gorgonio, 11,499’, the highest in Southern California, and to the south to Mount San Jacinto, 10,834’ rising above Palm Springs.  

On walking down from Warren View, Ed and I parted paths.  I looked for clues as to how this might have happened, and came upon this trail junction, where a trail goes right, and is indicated as the wrong trail by a row of rocks.  Perhaps those rocks were not there in 2010 and Ed went that way by mistake.  It’s only a guess.  Neither trail is easy to follow.  They both have about the same wear.

I went back to the intersection of the Warren View Trail and Warren Peak Trail, and hiked up to Warren Peak, a steep rocky climb to the summit.  

Warren View at right edge of picture
 taken from Warren Peak

Southeast of Warren View
taken from Warren Peak

From the peak, I looked down on Warren View where Ed and I were last at the same place.  I tried to picture being disoriented in the hills and washes below me.  I wondered what I might have done if I were out there trying to find my way back onto the trail I came on.  

At the summit, another trail comes up from the north.  not shown on any of my maps.  It probably comes up from the West Side Loop Trail, but I can’t find any information on it.  

Panorama Loop Trail, looking upstream

Panorama Loop Trail, looking upstream

Ed Rosenthal said that at some point in his wonderment he came upon a well-used trail, but that it was unfamiliar and seemed heading in the wrong direction.  Perhaps it was Panorama Loop Trail (see map).  So I went to where that trail joins the trail I came up on.  It’s a gentle trail in a wash with easy access for someone approaching it from the southwest.  

I turned back after a mile or so and went back to Black Rock Canyon, unsure how Ed Rosenthal lost the right path. 

When I met Ed recently at his hometown, Culver City, at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, we agreed that I would not write about the trauma that he must have endured during those six days when he was lost.  That is his story.  Instead, I would try to retrace some of his steps and write my story of that experience.  I have many more pictures and details to share with him.  I hope to see him soon and talk of a possible collaborative story.   

Rescuers hiked all these trails several times in 2010.  They flew over the area repeatedly for six days, looking for a lost hiker.  Eight years later, I am looking too, not to find him, but as one searches for evidence to enlighten her story.