Photo essay: A great day for a freehike

But the honeybees had other ideas

(Photo credit: Ivar Leidus/Wikimedia Commons)

LOS ANGELES — Southern California Naturists had a freehike scheduled this weekend, and I was eagerly looking forward to it. But as the old saying goes, If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans. Thursday, it was 80F and sunny, but the scheduled day of the hike was Sunday. Over the last couple of weeks, Sunday’s forecast has slowly degraded to 50% chance of rain, 55F, cloudy and breezy.

I didn’t get very far on this hike. The skull and cross bones marks where I got swarmed by bees, met a pickup truck and turned around.

This is the trailhead for Boulder Canyon Trail. The road to get here is rough but drivable with 2WD, but be cautious. Just around the curve, I doffed my clothes.

The day was warm, the sky was clear, and the trail inviting.

I decided to skip the scheduled hike and go on my own on Thursday. The hike starts as a foot trail cut to bypass private ranch property because of frequent trespassing and then follows a 4WD trail for a bit. Locked gates at each end should keep any traffic at bay. My clothes were off within 20 feet of the truck trail I parked on.

This is called a bush poppy. It is a shrub that can grow above head height.

I think this is a variety of Ceonathus, a member of the Lilac family.

The trail was cut to skirt around a ranch. People were trespassing. Owners did not want people to wander off down this bit of trailishness that followed along a creek.

This is Gold Creek.

It was absolutely perfect! No sign of another person on that foot trail for several days. Wildflowers were starting to bloom. I crossed a lovely stream. Slopes were mostly gentle, and I paused frequently for photos. Soon I came to the intersection with the 4WD route and continued on.

The trail wandered and curved along the hillside. There’s another creek to the right.

This is where the trail meets up with Boulder Canyon Road, 3N29.

After a quarter mile, I started encountering honeybees. At first a few, then many more. This is not usually a problem. I have walked through clouds of them, pollinating groves of mountain lilacs - but these bees were upset. They were dive-bombing me, trying to drive me away. My first reaction was to pull on some clothes and then continue on quickly, hoping to get past their hive. I did not want to have to cut the hike short.

There are no Africanized bees in this area. European honeybees do not want to sting you. You have to really work at it to get stung, like swatting at them or intruding on the hive.

Morning glories

I think this might be Freemont’s death camas, but I am unsure.

This is the view looking north, near where I turned around.

Pulling on my pants, I saw a pickup truck approaching from ahead. (I have no idea what they saw or if they saw anything before I got dressed. I was focused on what I was doing.) It stopped as it got next to me, and the passenger side window rolled down. A middle-aged couple was in it, with a man driving and a woman riding shotgun.

The woman said, “You probably don’t want to hike any further in this direction.”

The man said, “We just put out bee hives up ahead, and they are very angry about being moved.”

I said, “Well, I guess I won’t. Thank you for letting me know.”

The window rolled up, and they went on their way. The unhappy bees followed me for a bit, and I remained clothed all the way back to the car. Perhaps another day when the bees are not so grumpy.