Distance: 5.5 miles round trip on dirt road and use trail
Summit Elevation: 8330'
Elevation Gain: 1300'
Elevation Gain (in Empire State Buildings): 1.0
Round trip time: 2 hours 30 minutes
Recommended water: 28 oz.
Parking/Fees: Free on Forest Road 1N38
Difficulty: Easy
I drove up Highway 38, north of San Gorgonio and south of Big Bear, on the hunt for a couple of HPS peaks. Heart Bar (HPS #55) was first. I turned south onto Forest Road 1N38, aka Heart Bar Peak road. I parked in a turnout on the left a couple of hundred feet down the road. There was only room for one vehicle there. A quarter mile further was additional parking, but the road was pretty rough. The first mile of the road had large boulders, small logs, and deep ruts. If someone could drive the first mile, the road got considerably better all the way up to the use trail. I would not have tried it in my stock Tacmona. From my parking spot, the road started a series of long switchbacks. It was pleasant hiking amidst tall pines and cedars. The final ridge section was along a use trail. I lost it a few times, but picked it up again. There were two class 2 boulder piles that competed for the high point. The first one had fallen tree over it and a small cairn built where the Sierra Club HPS cans and registers were. I climbed up, signed in, and marked a waypoint. I continued down the ridge to the other boulder pile, climbed it, then marked another waypoint. By eyeball, it looked nearly the same height as the official one. Checking the waypoint later, the altitude was almost identical, well within the GPS margin of error. Views of the surrounding mountains were just OK. I didn't find any marks. I returned down the road and got ready for Onyx Peak.
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