It has been a while since I have posted anything to the blog. Lots of excuses but it boils down to a case of the moth in the light bulb syndrome that I get afflicted with now and then. I plan on catching up with the road trip to New England and family visits in Gloucester, Massachusetts. For now, I’m just going to try to get started with the most recent hike/jeep trip. Yep, there is a new car in the garage to accompany the small but powerful (albeit; very low to the ground CMAX). A 2020 Jeep Wrangler Sport, 2-door in blue has joined the family. What better spot to take it for a relatively easy road with great hikes, great geology, and now great (but relatively mild) Painted Canyon Road just east of Mecca, California.
You may recall that there are a couple of previous hikes described in the blog for the Painted Canyon Trail. Some of the longest mile paces we have ever seen on hikes because we were taking geology pictures, touching rocks and just being geologists in a geologic wonderland. There are three major faults in the vicinity including the San Andreas Fault (SAF). The rocks in the area span almost 1-billion years of time. The vast majority of the exposed formations were actually deposited less than 6 million years ago along the margins of the Coachella Valley and Lake Cahuilla with major influence of the SAF and its friends to the east. There is a smattering of 100-million-year-old rock exposures, particularly along the Painted Canyon Fault.
The picture below is a geologic map taken from a paper by McNabb, et.al. (2017). The polygon on the map is about 8 miles both north-south and east-west. The nasty looking wiggly black lines that trend from the northwest to the southeast are the faults in the area. The road in follows the squiggly magenta section line that trend from southwest to northeast in the lower rectangle.
There is a lot of tortured rock in this small area.
The Little Painted Canyon trail more or less trends northwest from where the two magenta lines intersect. It is a jeep/truck trail (we parked and hiked it although it would have been a relatively easy drive) and is significantly different than the Painted Canyon trail in that there are numerous side drainages that intersect the trail itself rather than hang from the cliffs. Also, the canyon is not as steep sided along the Little Painted Canyon trail as on the Painted Canyon trail. All in all, a very pleasant hike as we did not have to watch our footing as much. We did not go to the end as we needed to get back to the ranch for sunset.
Pictures below include some shots at the Painted Canyon Fault and then follow our out and back hike along the trail from the parking area.
