Old Stagecoach Trail @ Santa Susana Pass Park

Details

http://photos2.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/e/6/a/2/event_208499042.jpeghttp://photos3.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/d/8/a/6/event_208495462.jpegWe're going to hike the old stagecoach trail! What is cool about this trail is that you'll see the marks left in the trail from the old stagecoaches!!!! We'll also hike to Devil's Slide where people used to take their stagecoaches! You won't believe stagecoaches could go down it! It is quite steep! This will be the steep part of the trail.

This is a neat hike because it has really neat rock formations!

Meeting Spot:

Meet at 2 PM in front of the Oakwood Memorial Park Cemetery--don't worry we're NOT hiking in a cemetery. This cemetery is a beautiful place for a final resting place! We'll leave at 2:15 PM. We'll go on an approx. 4 miles RT hike. It has 700 feet elevation gain (to Devil's Slide). Bring water and sneakers with good traction.

Dogs ok as long as they are on a leash.

Don't recommend this hike for beginners--unless they are in decent shape.

History:

The trail’s precipitous drop earned it the

name “Devil’s Slide.” Drivers employed various

strategies to keep from losing control of the

stagecoach. Often during the descent, drivers

asked passengers to get out and walk, or to

carry rocks with which to block the wheels.

Mules and horses were blindfolded and coaxed

to descend the pass. At times the iron rims of

the locked coach wheels sparked against the

sandstone. One passenger described seeing

a “streak of fire” caused by the wagons’ brake

shoes rubbing against the iron wheel rims.

In the 1860s, travel between the San Fernando and Simi valleys (and all the way to San Francisco) meant riding a stagecoach on the rugged Old Santa Susana Stage Road with its perilous section, Devil’s Slide, a short, bone-rattling path so steep drivers would blindfold their horses before heading down it. Today, you can travel this trail by foot, hiking on the Old Stagecoach Trail in 680-acre Santa Susana Pass State Historic Park (http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=611). Discover just how rough the journey over the Simi Hills must have been on a rocky, 3-mile round-trip hike climbing 700 feet along sandstone cliffs.

Movies Filmed Here:

The Spahn Ranch

The park’s sandstone bedrock gives a

wide-open “badlands” look, used as the

background for many western films and

television programs. The 500-acre Spahn

Ranch, located within the park’s northern

boundary, was one of several “movie

ranches” in the area. Between the late 1940s

and the late 1960s, dozens of films and

television shows, including Duel in the Sun, The Lone Ranger,

Roy Rogers and Bonanza episodes, were