%20WHITE.jpg)
After taking a short break from hiking I went back to my old friend the Colby Trail, the trail I started on. This is a short trail but has a steady climb so is good to practice on. During my hike on this trail with my friend Pam I really felt the impact of that week off! I struggled and had to stop several times to rest. Although, we made it, I was disappointed in my performance. Two days later I decided to go back to “Punk-Out-Point” in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. I needed to prove to myself something, after my Colby Trail performance earlier in the week, that I was making progress at least. This was my fourth attempt at reaching “Punk-Out-Point”
The Mystic Canyon/Upper Monroe Trail is a 9.2-mile trail. The first 1.4 miles of this trail is very steep and very hard the elevation change is 1,000 ft. At the top of this first part of the trail is a point and marker apply named “Poop-Out-Point”. We made it to Poop-Out-Point fairly easily this time out! After reaching Poop-Out-Point, we went on to “Punk-Out-Point”. The last part of the trail to punk out was very steep and loose and the day was beginning to get hot. We trekked and climbed onward and upward and made it to Punk Out, finally what an accomplishment, I felt good! At Punk Out is an amazing 360 view of the San Gabriel Mountains and the San Gabriel Valley, a nice reward for our efforts! We enjoyed the view for some time as we had some snack and water but as the day was getting hot and we were at our limits we decided to turn back and headed down. The trip to Punk Out took us 2 hours and 15 Minutes with the total round trip completed in 4 hours 15 minutes. The temperature on the way out was reaching 100 degrees so was very hot and we were glad to be out of that!
At some point, we plan to hike the entire 9.2 miles of the Mystic Canton/Upper Monroe Trail.