Indian Truck Trail
| Indian Truck Trail is a fire road that climbs up the eastern slopes of the Santa Ana Mountains in Riverside County between Lake Elsinore and Corona. It is roughly six miles long and climbs about 3,000 before connecting up with the Main Divide Truck Trail that runs along the peaks of the entire Santa Ana mountain range. It is a good workout all on its own and when you combine it with some of other trails that can be accessed via Main Divide you can create some real quad killing, lung busting, "I can't get that stupid grin off of my face" rides. | ||||||||||||||
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Here
is the map and elevation profile of the Indian Truck Trail. This is map also shows the intended
and actual routes followed for the Coldwater trail which was going to be part of
a loop. Read more about that adventure below.
GPS Files: TPO.   GDB |
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| Directions: Due to some development going on in the area, these directions are to a parking area that will available no matter what the status of the construction/development. | ||||||||||||||
| From LA and areas north - Get yourself onto I-15 and head south. After passing through Corona and by Tom's Farm (look for the big billboards), take the Indian Truck Trail exit. Turn right and look for the dirt parking area on the right immediately on your right. Park here. | ||||||||||||||
| From San Diego and areas south - Take I-15 north through Temecula and Lake Elsinore. Shortly after the fishing lake on your right (There is a big white rock sign on the side of the mountain that says "fishing") is the Indian Truck Trail exit. Take the exit, and at the exit stop sign, turn left and go under the freeway. Look for and park in the dirt parking area on the right immediately after going under the freeway. | ||||||||||||||
Ride Notes: Due to the construction/development going on in the area, the exact way to the truck trail may change. The developers have put up directional signs that say to Cleveland National Forest at all of the intersections so just follow along. At the time I did this ride here was the route. From the parking area, ride .1 miles to the the T-intersection of De Palma/Campbell Canyon Rd. Turn right and travel slightly downhill .4 miles to Mayhew Canyon Rd on your left and turn left. Travel slightly up .3 miles and take a left on Santiago Canyon Road. The road will soon transition into dirt and about .4 miles you will make a very distinct right at a T-junction onto the Indian Truck trail. |
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After about .4 miles of gradual climbing on the truck trail you will pass by a Korean retreat/farm and after that you will have a couple of switchbacks before the views open up enough were you can see the truck trail snaking it way up the mountainside. |  |
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The main views you will see from here is Indian Canyon below you to the south with Trabuco Peak at 4,604 feet off to your left as you climb. |
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At around 2.5 miles into the climb the you have transitioned from the sage and scrub brush into pine trees. You will also have crossed over to the north side of the ridge you are climbing and will now have Mayhew Canyon below and to your right with Santiago Peak at 5,687 feet ahead of you. The top of the large ridgeline above the north side of Mayhew Canyon is where the Upper Holy Jim starts as well where the upper portion of the Coldwater trail runs. |
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The climbing is not unrelenting as there are a few level spot here and there and at 4.1 miles the truck trail actual turns downhill and drops a little under 200 feet of elevation before putting you back into climbing mode at around 4.75 miles. It is quite refreshing to get some speed back under your feet again and working the climbing efforts even if it is short lived. There is only about 3/4th of a mile of climbing left before you arrive at the junction of the Main Divide Truck Trail at around 5.5 miles. (Point A on the map) |
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From here, you have the quite a few options.
Here are some of the combo rides that I know of people doing using the
Indian Truck Trail (ITT). Some of them are downright huge in scope.
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On this day the plan was to hang a right take Main Divide up to the top of the Upper Holy Jim trail. While it is only 3 miles to the to that point the last 1.5 miles can be quite mean. It was not too much work to get to the junction of the bottom of the Upper Holy Jim and the top of the Holy Jim trail at Bear Springs. Point B on the map. |
Bear Springs |
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The next 1.5 miles were quite tough on climbing fatigued legs. Particularly since Jerry and I were both on our gravity enhanced rigs vice our spry climber rides. This section was gravelly and combined with its average grade of 17 percent it was a grunch of work. You know you are in the right spot when you come up to a really large opening at a left hand switchback that has been chewed up by the four-wheeled drive types. Just shy of the switchback is the singletrack heading off to the right. Point C on the map. Do not jump down the trail yet. Continue to the apex and take in the great views from 4,874 feet. Including a few ups and downs you have put in about 4,000 feet of climbing to get to this point. Enjoy it and have a snack. |
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Upper Holy Jim and Coldwater
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The Upper Holy Jim Trail is short but fun add-on to the Holy Jim trail.
If you are doing a one of the big loops that take you over Santiago Peak, such
the Harding to Holy Jim loop this
is a much better way to go down than using the Main Divide Truck Trail. Splitting off from the Upper Holy Jim trail is the Coldwater Trail. It is no longer maintained by Forest Service and there are some private properties at the bottom of the trail that causes access issues. |
To the best of my knowledge there are only a couple of single tracks going down the eastern slopes of the entire Santa Ana Mountain Range, Coldwater and East Horsethief. Both of these trails have private property access issues at the bottom. I believe that the population of the communities at the base of the eastern slopes of the Santa Ana Mountains deserve access to at least a couple recreational trails and public easements should be granted for the original (and historic) trails of Coldwater and East Horsethief.
Some views from along the Upper Holy Jim trail. The picture on the right is the split for the Coldwater trail
Some views from along the Coldwater Trail
Since Coldwater is no longer being maintained by the Forest Service and there
are access issues with this trail I have not included the trail on the map.
I will tell you that the trail shown on all of the USGS topographic maps is
extremely hard to follow starting about halfway down and you will do some
serious bushwhacking as well.
