Location: North N34.12028, W118.92212, (GPS at the summit)
Climbed November 4, 2018.
Difficulty: YDS class 1
Information:
How to get there:
Drive Hwy. 1 north from Los Angeles to
Malibu. Continue until you have Neptune's Net
(a bar/restaurant) on your right. Immediately
after this (popular place among bikers!) place,
turn right and drive up the small valley until
you find the trailhead for Sandstone Peak on your
left hand side of the road. This location is
N34.11148, W118.92679, elevation about 625 meter.
Park here. If this parking is completely full, one
may continue to the
top of the hill and find an alternative parking/trailhead there.
From this alternative parking there is atrail that connects
nicely with the Sandstone Peak trail.
Route:
There is a loop taril that may be followed, called Backbone
trail, with the direct and shortest trail being a part of tis
loop. Start from the parking, soon there is a tral forking left
that should be ignored. Next, you will arrive at the main
loop fork. Going left will take you directly towards the
summit, while going right will be the somewhat longer trail
where Sandstone Peak will be the last peak before descending back
down to the parking. The complete loop is only slightly more than
10 kilometer.
As you get very close to the peak (on the west side of the trail),
you must take a short side trail to access the peak itself. This
may be slightly steeper, but not difficult.
Comments:
I did this climb on my first day after returning from Norway.
I had nice company with my friends Ellen and Sverre having arrived
also the day before from Denver.
We first climbed Sandstone Peak,
then proceeded to visit
Inspiration Point, followed by a short, but nice scramble to
the summit of Exchange Peak (slightly over 900 meter, less than
100 meter of prominence.)
We next continued to Tri-Peak.
Its highest point looks hard to climb.
I explored a direct route up passing a distinct hole in the rock face.
Standing in this hole, the rest of the scramble appeared quit doable,
good holds, but steepish and exposed. I decided against it having
no slings to protect the descent. I later read on Summitpost that
there is an easier way if I had contoured a bit down and
further to my right when facing the cliff.
We rested in the sun, then descended back down to the main trail
and completed the loop hike. Further onwards one will
see a balancing rock,
quite nice. There is also a short side trail for
those that would like to visit up close.
We returned to the car around 1440, the trip with generous
rests/stops had taken us slightly less than 4 hours.
We next drove back down to Malibu where Ellen got a nice
November swim in the Pacific.
