No book in my library has been leafed through, consulted, and read more often than John W. Robinson’s “Trails of the Angeles, 100 Hikes in the San Gabriels.” With the logical exception of a 1972 Larousse dictionary my mom gifted me as a schoolboy in the Jura region of Switzerland who couldn’t point to the San Gabriel Mountains on a map if his life depended on it–they don’t appear in the Larousse. The rapid evolution of web resources like Wikipedia has retired my Larousse, but not the “100 hikes”. No author, no human being, has had a more direct influence on my passion for hiking, and no guide has taught me more about our local mountains. So it was with great sadness that I learned, just last week, that he had passed away in April.

R.I.P. John Robinson. This hike is for you.

(Insert “Hike 101, a short story” here).

 

P.S: Somewhere along the Gabrielino trail above Oakwilde you may or may not find a little note I left for you. I know, I littered, I left a trace, but I guess that was the point, at least it’s bio-degradable, fully-reclycled paper, and I picked up all my trash. Promise. I always do. As a matter of fact, I often pick up other people’s trash.

Walking Project 135_hike 101 – bear-brown-arroyo loop from chris worland on Vimeo.