#128 Marshall Peak & More

Walking FR 2N40 toward Marshall Peak.

Southern California Map.

Driving Map.

Overall Hiking Totals:

Hiking Map.

Google Maps Trailhead Link

Parking coordinates: 34.2103°N, -117.3025°W.

Summary

Views over San Bernardino.

The hike begins from a parking area off Highway 18.  This is also the beginning of Forest Road 2N40.  The road is drivable, but it is rather rough and steep in places.  Since I was there to hike anyway, I kept my car off the dirt roads and just walked them.  FR 2N40 intersects Cloudland Truck Trail in 1.3 miles.  At that point, there is a four way junction, with Marshall Peak straight ahead.  I chose to go right and visit the highest point on the hike first, Peak 4120. 

Looking down toward Marshall Peak.

I followed a utility road to its top in 0.3 miles and about a 220 foot gain. A utility building and tower sits on the summit.  After a quick turnaround, my next target was Marshall Peak.  This would mark my fourth visit to its summit, where paragliders often utilize as a launching point.  On this day, there were no paragliders there, which made for a more peaceful summit visit than usual.  Since my plan was to get all the nearby peaks, I next ventured over to Cloud Peak, which was due west about a mile.  The road went most of the way, with a slight diversion to the summit.  Views were similar to Marshall Peak, but the difference was that Marshall Peak was in the view.

On the summit of Cloud Peak.

After quickly having three peaks in the bag, I wanted to include two more that were lower down the ridge to the southeast.  It is possible to park lower down on Highway 18 to get a closer jumping off point to these lower peaks, but the parking situation is not very plentiful.  I instead decided to add it to this hike and get all of them in one shot.  This meant that I had to descend the ridge and lose about a thousand feet of elevation along the way.  This, of course, meant that I would need to re-gain that elevation coming back.  However, with the specter of achieving two new summits, I hesitated very little and set off.  The first peak was just a little below Marshall Peak, which was Peak 3992.  This peak seemed almost like a twin peak to Marshall Peak, however, since it was slightly shorter it got completely overlooked, and even un-named.

Looking over at Marshall Peak from Peak 3992.

I continued the drop on the ridge to reach a use trail, that led to the lower summit of the day, Peak 3215. Peak 3215 also has a utility building and towers crowning the top.  I took in this new summit for me, but all I could think about was the long climb back up Cloudland Truck Trail.  I sucked it up, though, and made it back with little difficulty.  It was nice to turn off my climbing gear, though, on the way back to the parking lot from the junction with Marshall Peak.

Approaching Peak 3215.

Video:

Simulated Hike: