Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
A hundred feet farther, the second site sits atop the west end of the bench and is large
enough to accommodate up to two tents.
Beyond camp the trail leads 0.1 mile to the first major river bend and your second
boulder-hop across the Miller Fork. You'll follow an old roadbed heavily overgrown
with poison oak and cross the river three more times before arriving in
Clover Basin
Camp
(7.7 miles, 1870').
This camp occupies a large meadow amid a marshy basin near the banks of the
Miller Fork. Equipped with a fire ring and tree stump seating, the camp can accom-
modate up to four tents. Mosquitoes and flies can be a nuisance in all but the driest
months. American Indians roamed this watershed for thousands of years, as evidenced
by mortar holes in rocks adjacent to camp. Here the Esselen tribe hunted a wide vari-
ety of birds, fish, and mammals and gathered a variety of acorns to leach and grind
into flour.
Past camp, you'll closely follow the Miller Fork, occasionally picking your way
through unavoidable thickets of poison oak. The trail meanders along the deep, nar-
row river gorge blanketed in ferns, mugwort, and blackberries, as well as colorful
alders, maples, buckeyes, and bays. You'll cross the river 16 more times before reach-
ing the
Carmel River Trail junction
(10.2 miles, 1220').
From this junction, the trail crosses the Miller Fork just above its confluence and
returns upstream to China Camp along the
Carmel River
and
Pine Ridge Trails.
See
TRIP 45 Hiding Canyon & Round Rock Camps
for the route description to
Hiding
Canyon Camp
and
TRIP 50 Hiding Canyon & Round Rock Camps
for the route from
Hiding Canyon to China Camp (follow the latter in reverse). If you're on a point-
to-point trip from China Camp to
Los Padres Dam,
continue downstream along the
Carmel River Trail 4.8 miles below the confluence to the Los Padres Dam Trailhead.
Refer to
TRIP 44 Bluff & Carmel River Camps
and follow that trail description in
reverse.
