Tucked away in a tree-lined canyon within the San Gabriel Mountains is a story spanning 131 years, kept alive by tough perseverance and continuous restoration within the battle against the relentless force of Mother Nature.
Sturtevant Camp, founded in 1893 by packing and mountain climbing pioneer Wilbur Sturtevant throughout the Great Hiking Season, has seen a brand new group of tourists make the 4.2-mile hike from here Chantry Flat Recreation Area, which reopened Oct. 2 after 4 years of closure.
Four years and a month since then the Bobcat fire, After years of rain that washed away trails and bridges and left trees limping through cabin roofs, the camp and its legendary Sturtevant Lodge have come back to life.
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The camp won’t accept reservations for overnight guests until January 2025, he said, after crews complete maintenance on the cabins.
Sturtevant built the camp to make some more money. He lived in Sierra Madre, not removed from the doorway to Chantry Flat and Big Santa Anita Canyon. But the pack train business, like the remainder of the economy during a depression, was in shambles within the Eighteen Nineties. So he thought people might need a trip to the mountains.
“It’s the same today as it was then,” Keene said. “To go to the mountains and stay there.”
Early advertisements called it a “hotel in the mountains,” Keene said, with some people camping outdoors. “In the lodge, they pulled back the tables and danced.” Completed in 1898, the lodge contains a industrial kitchen, dining room, fireplace and game room. There are electric lights, but no power outlets, no Wi-Fi and no cellular phone reception.
“You can come here and leave everything behind. And your phone doesn’t ping every three minutes,” Keene said.
The camp consists of 10 buildings. Three are original and include the Lodge; a forester's hut; and a remaining public cottage called the Honeymoon Cottage, which was barely large enough for a double bed. The ranger cabin is the oldest on its original foundation within the country, Keene said.
There are seven other buildings, including a tool shed and 4 other cabins, where people can stay overnight starting in January, he said. The “newer” cabins were in-built the Sixties, when the camp was still owned by the United Methodist Church. A retreat hut has a kitchenette, a toilet with a shower and a small double bed, in addition to a bedroom for the parents and a bunk room for 4 children.
All visitors are reminded to treat the positioning with care. “It's like visiting your grandma. “You have to treat them gently,” Keene said.
People who’ve hiked to the camp describe the world as a mini Yosemite with tall trees, sloping canyons, gurgling streams and colourful wildflowers. The flora features a rare, untouched stand of bigcone spruces. The canyon can also be famous for its Pacific madrone trees, which have red bark and broad leaves.
Sturtevant selected this idyllic location for his camp, just above Sierra Madre and Arcadia, just a couple of miles from nearly 2 million people within the San Gabriel Valley. On Wednesday, October 2, dozens hiked to the lodge despite the nice and cozy temperatures. Motorized vehicles are usually not permitted to access the positioning. Keene said people come not only from the San Gabriel Valley, but in addition from Huntington Beach, Long Beach, Los Angeles and Beverly Hills.
In addition to unique trees and several types of people, the forest area surrounding the camp also attracts occasional wildlife, including deer and California black bears. These animals haven't seen many individuals in 4 years, so that they could also be more prone to approach people, Keene said.
The site's Facebook page reminds people to not run from bears. Instead, you must appear larger, make noise and scare them away. Keene said he saw a mother bear and her three cubs on a close-by trail three weeks ago.
Volunteers from two groups spent 4 years rebuilding the paths, while other employees rebuilt cabin roofs and installed a brand new water system. The nonprofit Restoration Legacy Crew performed reconstruction work on the most important trail to the camp, the Gabrielino Trail. The San Gabriel Valley Trailbuilders was doing trail work on a spur, the Winter Creek Trail, he said.
Heavy rains had washed out parts of the road to the camp. Branches, including full-grown trees, had fallen and blocked the trail. Crews used chainsaws to chop tree trunks and clear the trail, he said.
“Thanks to all our volunteers, the trails have never been better. They’re nicer and smoother,” Keene said. However, not all nearby mountain climbing trails within the canyon are open. The Mt. Zion, Mt. Wilson and Newcomb Pass trails are closed.
The bears became an issue almost immediately when people on the lodge suddenly left the lodge at the primary sign of smoke in September 2020.
“The bears completely trashed the kitchen and tore the refrigerator apart. “A cast iron skillet was found with a bite cut out of it,” Keene described.
They kept coming back, even after human food disappeared. They dug into the constructing's wood siding and searched for maggots.
“We are constantly busy repairing bear damage,” he said.
More recently, the bear population has moved away from the camp and into the canyon, he said.
With the restoration nearly complete, the following task is management — or ensuring the paths stay clear and trash is picked up, he said.
A volunteer brought her young daughter along with her, and crews began to see the kid as a type of mascot or mirror, allowing the lodge and camp to look into the longer term, Keene said.
“Everything we do is for that child, to make sure he’s there when he grows up. We are all the beneficiaries,” Keene said.
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