I have a problem, and it involves me making everything ten times more difficult than it needs to be. Whenever I search for my next hiking trail to tackle, I tend to look for the longest, highest-elevation paths. The Caliente Mountain Ridge Trail is no different.
I knew I would be near the central coastal area, so I purposely searched for the tallest mountain. At 5,106 feet, Caliente Mountain showed up in the search as the highest point in San Luis Obispo County and the Caliente Range. I had never been to that area before, only knew that the mountain sat within the Carrizo Plain National Monument and was managed by the Bureau of Land Management. I found the only trail that led all the way to the summit and started looking at maps.
The Caliente Mountain Ridge Trail is an 8.5-mile path that follows the ridgeline of the Caliente Range. So, when you plan for the hike, you’re actually hiking 17 miles because you have to make the return trip back to the trailhead, unless you have mastered teleportation or scheduled a helicopter to airlift you out of the wilderness and take you back to your vehicle. Caliente Mountain, which was the site of a WWII airplane watch hut, reveals a now fallen structure and a reminder of other human challenges from the not-so-distant past. The long hike to and from the mountain itself has nonstop spectacular views of all the mountains and the beautiful wildflowers blooming all around, but it’s also fully exposed with no shade and leaves you sweating under the blazing sun.
I solo hiked the trail and didn’t come across another soul until I was on my way back from the summit. I saw a few mountain bikers, an incredibly fast solo hiker, and another hiker closer to the trailhead with her dog as I made my way back through the fields of wildflowers. I had camped the night before at Selby Campground, which is a dispersed backcountry site. People piled on top of each other, and there was trash sitting in the vault toilet.
The entire time I was there, I thought to myself, “No one is making you do any of this,” but the idea of adventure and seeing something new and sites that not everyone gets the chance to see kept me out there in the wilderness. No one made me choose the highest mountain in the area, but the thought of standing at the top of a mountain ridge while seeing the natural alkali lake and wetlands from above, surrounded by wildflowers, seemed appealing.
After nearly six hours of hiking, I thought about all of the other challenging things that I put myself through. The Master’s degree I pursued, the professional career I put over a decade into, the art that I have created, the marathons and half-marathons that I have run, the other peaks I have scrambled to reach, the outdoor classes and trips that I have planned and led with youth and adults, and regularly updating a blog and vlog to document all my adventures. No one forced me to do any of this, and yet here I am, still choosing to do the most challenging things so I can look back and say I did them.
Here’s the footage from my time along the Caliente Mountain Ridge.