Sunset (SDC #34 , 3658′) • map • directions*

Borrego, W. Butte (SDC #28, 1207′) • map • directions

Borrego, E. Butte (SDC #31, 1196′) • map • directions

 

It had been a cold and windy night in Anza Borrego, so windy that Anna and I slept in the front seats of my Tacoma. We had parked on a shoulder just off of highway 78 and some how managed a decent night’s sleep. We left the warmth of the cab of the truck at 7am, greeted with the same sub-freezing temps that we experienced yesterday morning. After brushing our teeth and gulping down a quick breakfast, we drove down Pinyon wash and found a fork in the road 1.6 miles from the highway. I had anticipated that the road would require four-wheel-drive from the fork but it looked like more of the same so we hung a left and drove another mile towards Sunset, being careful not to stop in one of the pockets of deeper sand. 

 

 

Sunset Mountain was in full view from where we parked and I tried to pick out a route while we put on ice-cold sunblock and filled our water bottles. Anna and I hiked half of a mile to the base of the mountain where the scrambling started in earnest. 

 

 

Routefinding wasn’t much of an issue and one particular slope or ridge didn’t look any better or worse than the rest, we just went up looking for the path of least resistance through the boulder and cactus choked slopes. The ascent never really exceeded class 2, though it was nonstop from the desert floor to the summit, with 1800 feet of gain in the final mile. 

 

 

 

Located near the center of Anza Borrego State Park, the views from the summit of Sunset were impressive. We could see the Vallecito mountains to the south, Granite Mountain to the west, and the Borrego Mountains, our next objective for the day, to the northeast. The obstacles being more of a challenge than the actual uphill effort, it took as long to get down as it took to ascent and we arrived back at the truck at 11:30am, our pace hovering near the 1 mile per hour mark. We changed into clean shirts and drove back out to the 78, headed for the Borrego Mountains. 

 

 

 

 

Borrego, W. Butte

After leaving Sunset Mountain, we quickly found the turnoff for “The Slot” near mile 87.2 off of Highway 78. The truck’s high clearance came in handy in just one rough spot near the parking area, otherwise the two mile dirt road was well groomed. We found a faint use trail heading east from where we parked and followed it over a few small wrinkles towards the West Butte of Borrego Mountain. Once near the summit plateau we scramble up through a short section of jumbled rock and began looking for the summit register at 12:58pm, just 21 minutes after leaving the truck. 

 

 

 

Anna and I checked several possible high points on the wide summit of West Borrego without luck. The views were expansive and I was drawn to the sight of the East Butte of Borrego Mountain, blending into the bare desert floor and the sand stretching on for miles behind the peak. 

 

 

After dropping 150 feet or so back down the west side of West Borrego we turned right at an obvious trail junction, heading northwest towards the Borrego Mountain jeep trail. A worn footpath led most of the way and once down into the wash we turned south to explore the slot canyons. The slot canyons are worth a visit, though care should be taken to avoid getting lost. In fact, Anna and I scrambled our way out of one dead end and were lucky we didn’t have to spend more time backtracking. 

 

 

 

Borrego, E. Butte

I wasn’t sure how we were going to approach the East Butte of Borrego Mountain, but pulling into the parking lot for the Ocotillo Wells ranger station/discovery center got us to within 1.25 miles of its summit. We spent 10 minutes walking towards a prominent gully running up the south side of the mountain. It had looked rough rom further back but not bad at all once we were staring up at it.

 

The gully turned out to be a lot of fun, mostly class 2 with some intentional class 3.  From the top of the gully we scrambled onto the summit plateau and hiked a quarter mile over the moon-like landscape to the actual highpoint. We found the seldom visited register at 4:20pm, just as the sun was starting to set. We took in the views of the endless desert and the Salton Sea then put our headlamps on so that we wouldn’t have to stop on the way out. The round-trip took an hour and fifty minutes.

 

 

 

 

 

Once back at the truck we took our time packing up, hesitant to get mixed up with the countless trailers towing their off-highway vehicles home after the long Thanksgiving weekend. We stopped for what must have been our fourth or fifth time this season for Mexican food in Ramona, after another successful weekend in what was becoming one of my favorite places, Anza Borrego.

 

 

 

*-the driving directions for Sunset get you to the turnoff for the Pinyon wash. Continue south on the wash for ~2.6 miles to the base of Sunset, keeping left at a fork 1.6 miles from the 78. Be careful not to get stuck in the sand, which gets softer after the fork.