The California Riding and Hiking Trail is a 38 mile “Thru-Hike” across the backcountry of Joshua Tree National Park. This trail features easy to moderate terrain difficulty with breathtaking views, star-filled nights, and seclusion far away from the busy crowds the park has gained in recent years. Water is mandatory to cache prior to the start of the hike. There are no available water sources to rely on anywhere between the North entrance and Blackrock Campground.
Preparation: We decided to do this hike from the West to East; starting at Blackrock Campground and ending at the North entrance CRHT backcountry board. Yeah, it’s a bit confusing… The North entrance is technically North (near Twentynine Palms), but you hike the majority of the trail West to East and finish the last section traveling North. The great thing about starting from the West, is that it puts you at a starting elevation of 4,000’. The max elevation of the trail is around 5,000’ and you will make it to this height on the first day. That means once you get to about mile ten, it’s all downhill from here baby! Well, sort of…There will be a few more uphill sections on days two and three, but the long stretches of slight incline are hardly noticeable on the ol’ legs.
We drove out to Joshua Tree the night of the 23rd and arrived around midnight. We started our three water caches working backwards, from the North entrance and making our way West. One cache at Pinto Basin Rd, one at Geology Tour Rd, and one at Keys View Rd. Given our original four day time frame, we thought this distance between caches would work best. It was too much of a hassle to off-road outside the park to cache at Covington Flats Rd around 2am in a stock Honda CRV. We were originally planning on caching our Day 1 drop at Juniper Flats Rd, but the gate has been closed to vehicle access. If you plan on filling up your first day, your only options are to drive to Upper Covington Flats Rd (outside the park) to drop a cache, or camel up and hike to Keys View Rd (mi. 18.5) from the start of the trail. Due to the cool weather, we opted to pack 4 liters each for Day 1 and refill the morning of Day 2 at Keys View Rd.
Once done with our caching, we decided to sleep in the back of the car for the night at the North BLM free camping zone. We then drove back to the North entrance around 5am to drop off our car in the hiker lot and request our Uber shuttle for a trip over to Blackrock Campground to start the hike. We both surprisingly had service in the hiker lot with Google Fi and AT&T to arrange the pick up.
Day 1: Day 1 was definitely the roughest out of the three, but by no means a challenge. This was not just because of the starting incline mentioned earlier, but the intense howling winds we faced the entirety of the day. Some gusts were so strong, they would catch your pack like a sail and start to blow you over. It got a little sketchy on the single track switchbacks, but it did not feel overly dangerous as long as you stayed in the center of the narrow trail. The first fourteen miles or so of this trail has you going up and down like a rollercoaster the majority of the time. Once you get up the big wash to Crossover Rd (mi. 6) and get some altitude under your feet, the views really open up and the hike becomes stunning. I was not expecting this much diversity on this side of the park. Pines, oak, juniper, and sage, all scattered around the forever noble Joshua tree. You could sense that this area gets more moisture from rain runoff than others just by the flora and canyon-like landscape. It was like hiking in some hybrid desert coastal mountain environment where multiple climates have combined together in some symbiosis to create their own unique micro-climate. It completely caught me off guard and I had a blast taking in the diverse scenery.
After a short lunch break, we continued to hike to around mile fourteen and set up camp for the night. After having the dehydrated Thanksgiving feast we put together, we started to set up camp. Wind gusts around 60mph made pitching the tent an absolute treat… Surprisingly, I didn’t have to get out once during the night to tighten any guy lines or reseat stakes. The X-Mid held in there like a champ. The nightly lows on this trip were roughly in the high 30’s. I got a bit chilly in my understuffed quilt, but I managed to sleep great once I put some layers on. I swear this EE Revelation 20 is only comfort rated to 40.
Day 2: The morning of the 25th, we decided to skip breakfast and make it four and a half miles to our first water cache at Keys View Rd. We then headed to Ryan Campground for a quick bathroom break and trash dump to avoid packing all of it out until the end of the trip. About half a mile North-East of Ryan Campground, we stumbled upon a small rock climbing spot to post up for an early lunchbreak and siesta. The shady boulders made for a great place to chill out and recharge for a bit as we were making good time and were only two days in. I cooked up a bean, rice, and egg burrito and Lauren had one of her Mountain House meals. Once you leave the Ryan Campground area and continue on the CRHT, you will have a slight uphill incline section around 2.5 miles long. It’s only about 500’ of gain, and once you get behind Ryan Mountain, It’s a cruisy decline 8 miles all the way down to Pinto Basin Rd. After we topped off our water from our cache at Geology Tour Rd, we realized we were making much better time than expected and decided it would be best to turn our planned four day trip into a three day trip since the miles were coming much easier than expected. We hiked a bit further and set up camp about two miles before Pinto Basin RD. Wind was not an issue on Day 2 and we had plenty of time to relax and enjoy camp as the sun set over the empty desert basin.
Day 3: We decided to break camp early the morning of the 26th and proceed to our final cache at Pinto Basin Rd. This was the first time of our trip we finally saw the Thanksgiving visitor crowd. It looked like Disneyland out by Arch Rock. Fifty day hikers had to have passed us as we filled up. Luckily nobody stole or tampered with the cache we had semi-hidden behind a bush. It was practically in plain sight and I had a feeling that if one cache would have gotten messed with, it would have been this one. The seven miles from Pinto Basin Rd to the North backcountry lot was personally the least exciting part of the trip scenery wise. You essentially walk through a sandy wash parallel to the road roughly a quarter mile away from you. The last few miles of the trail are much more arid and bland compared to the others. This area isn’t terrible by any means, but certainly made me appreciate the section’s prior. We made it to the finish line around noon making the entire trail roughly a two and a half day hike. I feel this was the perfect amount of time to thoroughly enjoy the trail due to the beautiful weather. The weather was so great in fact, we ended up not needing nearly as much water as we expected and could have carried 3 liters from each cache, but based on previous trips out here, we played it safe and went with four. We’ve hiked Joshua Tree about twenty times in the past and we both without a doubt drank less water than we normally would have for the majority of this trip. As I’m sure all of you reading this know, the desert is a very dry place and visitors of the park have lost their lives being underprepared. Always carry more water than you think you need in the desert; regardless of the weight penalty. The park recommends a gallon a day per person on average. More in the warm months. Please don’t take my water experience on this trip as advice for yours.
Summary: The CRHT has hands down been my favorite official backpacking trail in the park thus far. It’s the perfect trip for a three day weekend get-away, or you can do it quick to train for a long thru-hike and big mile days. The terrain is comfortable and cruisy, the scenery is magnificent, and the trail has been practically empty every time I’ve been on it. In my opinion, the section from Upper Covington Flats to Keys view is the most interesting part. This is now my go-to section for overnights (I mean it’s not.. Please don’t go there and blow it up).
