April 2021 Big Bear Today Magazine

Big Bear Today April 2021—Page 5
Trails explore Sawmill Pebble Plain
Baldwin Lake Ecological Reseve gets
all the publicity and is the largest,
but it’s hardly the only Pebble Plain
terrain in Big Bear.
Indeed Pebble Plain, a soil and strata
system found only in Big Bear and a holdover
from the Ice Age, can be seen at locations
other than the east valley mainstay
(story page 4). Like between Moonridge
and Big Bear City, as Villa Grove, Sawmill,
Horseshoe and Dixie Lee Pebble
Plains bump shoulders amidst a towering
forest of Jeffrey and pinyon pines and a
few oaks too.
A cool trail system explores Sawmill
Pebble Plains Ecological Preserve, in the
middle of town yet completely remote. All
courtesy of San Bernardino Mountains
Land Trust, which in recent years purchased
about 750 acres in the area and created
a trail network with the help of volunteers.
Several trails explore this special area,
mostly well-marked with modest uphill
climbs and elevation gain. Plus there’s still
more loop and connector variations that
create multiple trail combinations, some
still a work in progress but most complete
and top-shelf quality.
Even better are the access points.
There’s eight or more trailheads with
signage and free maps detailing the area.
Moonridge portals can be found at Villa
Grove, Klamath, Tuolumne and Alameda
Rds, while Big Bear City trailheads include
Rose Hill plus Needle and Dixie Lee Lanes.
Plentiful signage on the trails is an-
other plus, showing the way and distance
between points. Like the recreation-oriented
South Shore Trail Network, which
has created Skyline Trail and several others,
the Land Trust’s conservation approach
to its system is user-friendly. All
this, mind you, has been done in just six
years, when Villa Grove was acquired before
Horseshoe was purchased in 2016.
Rose Hill Trail is one of the Preserve’s
hidden gems, gently rising above Big Bear
City near Community Market and leading
to Horseshoe Pebble Plain about 1-1/4
miles away. Enroute hikers or equestrians—like
Pacific Crest Trail, mountain
biking is not allowed in the Preserve—are
presented multiple choices, on veering to
scenic Lookout Point (worth doing), taking
connector loops and such.
At first glance Pebble Plain doesn’t
look that special, just a mix of gravel and
stones embedded in orange-tint clay soil
remiscent of Mars. Yet it’s some of the
planet’s most unique terrain, found only
in Big Bear and Holcomb Valleys and believed
to have been created during the
Pleistocene periods 10,000 years ago when
glaciers covered much of the area. Pebble
Plain is so special, it has been compared
to coral reefs with as many as 20 species
in a square meter.
Big Bear’s unique climate, particularly
in spring—freezing nights, warm days—
causes pebbles to literally push to the soil
surface. It takes unique species to live here,
like ash-grey Indian paintbrush, Bear Valley
Sandwort and Southern Mountain
Scenic hiking and wellmarked
trails in the Preserve
Buckwheat, all federally
threatened and found on the
Preserve. Or Parrish’s rock
cress and Douglass’ violets,
which appear in spring, native
only to Big Bear.
“The system is built to
basic Forest Service standards,”
said Tom Highberger,
who with wife Denise along
with Jim Baugh helped design
it. He spent 34 years
with the Forest Service in recreation management
so he would know.
“The goal was to get rid of roads and
have trails be the primary paths for lower
end hiking,” he said. “Horseshoe has been
degraded by vehicular traffic, but now that
it’s fenced it’s starting to come back.” He
added that the process takes about 10 years.
www.SBMLT.net for information.