Section 6: Encinal Canyon Road to Mishe Mokwa Trail

This long, gradual section passes through the most recently constructed part of the Backbone Trail. Much of the route combines old ranch roads and animal trails that weren’t constructed with modern-day hikers in mind. It’s also a place to think about the history of the place. Homesteaders who were given free land lived “incredibly harsh lives” in the mountains, he says. On the cusp of the old and the new, the early Southern Californians lived next to movie stars who were building homes nearby — and portraying them in Old West movies. Kind of ironic but not too unusual in Southern California.