A short stint on the Pacific Crest Trail to a mountain with a lot of history. A cool, shaded, north-face trail takes you to the summit’s old Nike Missile radio base, while (an alleged) bushwhack leads to old gold mines.

IMPORTANT: Please note that the roads leading to this trailhead are still closed due to damage from the 2009 Station Fire and the trails themselves are in very poor condition. We strongly recommend you choose another trail to hike until repair crews have had their chance to maintain this trail.

The trail begins just past a small metal gate at the northeast corner of a dirt parking area on the north side of the road and hooks up with the Pacific Crest Trail right away. The pine-lined path was shaded and cool, and starts off nice and level.

The PCT is well cared-for and generally clear of debris. There are, however, several nice fallen trees on the sides of the trail.

Eventually the trail does start to pick up a bit of elevation but it’s nothing too difficult. It is nice, however, to get out of the tree cover for a little while and see the stark transition the landscape makes – from desert to chaparral to pine. No matter how many times I see that, I’m always awestruck.

The trail was remote but I still passed a few other hikers on the way in. One was a new family carting off their baby daughter (good to get started early) and another was a group of pole-hiking older folks, who looked like they were having a great time out in the woods.

As the trail continues up the north side of Mount Gleason, it intersects what is either an old dirt road or the former grade of the PCT.

The book I’d read about this trail said it was possible to take this old road down into the canyon below, where the remnants of several major gold mines still stood. I followed the grade down for a short while, but eventually it got overgrown and I lost the path. I suppose it may be possible to just scramble down into the canyon, but as I didn’t have a great topo map with me, I just kept climbing up toward the summit instead.

There is an old gold mine in the canyon below this trail, but I’ve been informed that the land is privately held and no permission is given for hikers to enter.

As you get closer to the ridge, the trees start thinning out into mini-meadows, which are absolutely beautiful to hike through when the wind is tossing the grasses around.

The summit was surreal.

The former site of a Nike missile radio base, a large chunk of the natural summit had been leveled for the buildings, which have since been removed. The result is a seemingly out-of-place plateau surrounded by the more traditional-feeling forest.

Even though that weirded me out a little bit, by stepping south to the ridge I got a beautiful sweeping vista of Mount Lukens, Fox Mountain, and Condor Peak – their lower elevations still blanketed by our marine layer.

And just a tad north of the flattened land was an old, crumbling cabin or some leftover army building. If you hike here in the spring, you may also be treated to a nice bloom of lupines nearby.

After a short walk down a long disused paved road, the trail meets back up with the paved / dirt road I used to get to the trailhead, right by a more intact abandoned radio tower.

The tower is pretty much stripped bare and surrounded by a nasty barbed wire fence, so you won’t be able to do much exploring … but if you walk around the north side of the complex, you can find some nice boulders to sit on while you eat lunch … and take in some nice views of Strawberry Peak and the backs of the front range while you’re at it.

When you’re done, follow the abandoned road back to the trailhead.