Caliente Mountain 5,110′ and Caliente Ridge 4433′
Central Coast
Total Time: 5:35
Distance: 17.1 miles
Elevation Gain: 2400′
Crux: Class 1
Trailhead: Caliente Mountain Ridge Trail. No services.
With the days growing longing and I starting dreaming up summer adventures, I realized I hadn’t logged a day of double digit mileage since November of last year climbing Spectre Peak in Joshua Tree. With a few 30+ mile days penciled in my calendar for 2025, I needed to get my hiking stamina closer to summer shape. I wanted to log some higher mileage without dealing with snow, meaning much of the Sierra was off limits. So despite being over 3.5 hours of driving each way, I decided to finally tackle Caliente Mountain in Carrizo Plains National Monument. It’s featured on a number of lists I was peripherally chasing- Sierra Club Hundred Peaks Section, CA P2Ks, CA County Highpoints (SLO County) and California Fire lookouts, among many others. The standard route was a no frills 17 mile hike along a ridgeline fireroad, letting me get in some high mileage without any bushwacking, snow, or route finding issues to slow me down. And with Carrizo Plains National Monument famous for its spring superblooms, it seems like an ideal time to visit. I left well before sunrise, cutting through the central Valley and entering the Monument in darkness. I turned off onto Selby Road as the first rays of light began radiating from the east, following the easy dirt road as it slowly climbed up towards the ridgeline. I passed a spot on the ridgeline where we had taken Avery on her first camping trip 2 years prior, only to bail in the middle of the night from colder than expected temperatures. Parents of the Year Award….
The road high on the ridgeline transitioned to clay, and I was happy that the area had dried out enough from the rains a few days before- it may have been a sticky and impassable mess otherwise. I parked at a broad saddle and marked trailhead and started off, a brisk windy blowing across the ridgeline at sunrise.
After working around a small bump on a single track trail, the route rejoined the road, leading to an antenna farm on the intermediate point Caliente Ridge 4433′ at 3 miles in. With the cold winds, I hiked as quickly as possible to Caliente Ridge, getting there in under an hour.
Although I had planned to take a short break, there was no good spot out of the wind, so I began the descent of several hundred feet to a connecting saddle. There was a series of false summits between myself and the high point, all looking surprisingly far away. However the route was very direct; in fact, there was not a single switchback in the entire 17 miles. Near the saddle, I passed a small cattle pen, continuing past on single track trail to a large water catchment with a few trail cams.
I waved to the cameras and took my first break, the structure just off the ridgeline enough to be out of the wind. After I quick snack, I started my climb up another series of false summits, the ground transitioning from clay to sandstone. Small sandstone boulders and cliff bands pocketed the ridgeline higher up, with an impressive seashell fossil right on the trail. A cold cloud moved in obscuring visibility, and the hike suddenly felt more like being in the Santa Monica Mountains or coastal range between the sand and fog. The clouds meant I lost sight of the high point, unsure if each false summit I climbed would be the actual high point.
At last I spotted the ruins of the old fire lookout and hightailed it the last quarter mile, knocking out the first half of the 17 miles to the summit in under 3 hours. I was quite happy with my time given my lack of hiking over the winter. I had a bite to eat, hoping for a break in the clouds to sneak some views in any direction. But aside for some obscured views into the Valley to the south, the clouds never lifted from the summit, and I started back down the way I had came.
Having climbed the peak in under 3 hours, I now had a goal of trying to complete the 17 miles in 5.5 hours total, and picked up the paced where I could working down hill. Despite the direct nature of the route, there were still quite a few landmarks to track progress on the way out- the water catchment, the stables and going up and over Caliente Ridge, hitting that mark at exactly 4:45 from the start.
I just missed my goal of 5.5 hours total, finishing the last 3 miles from Caliente Ridge in 50 minutes, making for a total time of 5:35. Even still, I was quite pleased with my overall time, especially since it meant I would be getting home well before dinner, even with the long drive. After a quick tick check, I hopped in my car, dropped back down into the National Monument and began working north back home.
