Cleveland National Forest — Attraction in Alpine

If you plan to hike from the Palomar observatory campgrounds its 5 miles in and out. There were so many flies during most of the trail. Kids are able to hike the trail (my 3 and 5 year old hiked the entire 5 miles)but there is a lot of poison oak right on the trail so you will have to keep them from touching it. When you get to the musuem and gift shop on top, there is a water fountain and bathroom for you to use during their business hours. Also, if you did not want to hike you can just drive all the way to the observatory. The musuem is where you would purchase tour tickets. Tours are only on weekend only until October 2017 according to the women who worked at the musuem. The tour guide brings you to rooms you cannot access without being in a tour. Further up the road is the actually observatory. It was a sight to see. I am not sure if they had an elevator. I had to climb 2 flights of stairs to see the telescope behind the glass. It was huge and the kids were fascinated. If you hike, I recommend that you eat under the trees between the museum and the observatory because there were so many flies by the picnic area when we went. There were two tour buses at the top when we arrived so if you wait for them to go through the musuem and gift shop before you go in it won't be crowded. Otherwise, it is fairly small and it will feel cramped. There is a bathroom on the first floor of the observatory as well. The entrance to the observatory is 5500ft in elevation so the hike one way os about a 900ft elevation gain (mostly at the end of the 2.5 mile one way). With my kids and the lunch break and observatory/museum exploring. It was a 6 hour journey. If the kids were no along for the trip it would still have taken about 4 hours if you actually stop to read the signs in the musuem and you purchase items at...

Went and drove up to the waterfalls in Aguanga and took several really cool shots. One of the pics actually looks like a turtle. Watch out for the big house that overlooks the place...it belongs to either a sheriff or someone in politics. Well after having a good couple hours hiking and taking pictures and whatnot and enjoying ourselves we hopped in the car and started to slowly drive out of the lake bed to head back to the freeway and low and behold out of nowhere pops up a black and white patrol car with a female and a male officer inside. The older gentleman was training the female to become a police officer and apparently had something to prove or was just following all the rules in the book LOL they ended up making us all get out of the car searching the car and searching us then proceeded to tell us that nobody goes down there or drives their car down there unless they're going down there to commit crimes or do drugs and what were we really doing down there and after explaining we just went hiking to take pictures and what not, we even showed him the pictures they ended up taking one of my friends to jail over a warrant and giving me a ticket for expired registration which ultimately ruined the second half of the day as I had to sit and wait for my friend to get out of jail 7 hours later. What should have been a fun day trip to the waterfalls ended up being a drag. You can't even enjoy nature without being profiled and judged and that's not what was going on whatsoever. Beautiful and peaceful place though however, the person who lives in the big house overlooking the place needs to get a hobby though...

Today, Jan 21st, was a really good day to go. It was very cool, fresh, and bug free. Be forewarned, you must purchase a permit to visit the falls. It's about $6, I think. I got lucky today. It was free! Thanks to President Trump and US Congress and their budget impasse which is causing a governmen shutdown, i.e. no park rangers at the National Park today. The round trip six mile hike to and from the waterfalls is not for the faint of heart nor for the timid of spirit. There's a lot of slopes. Do not wear slippers or flip flops. Wear a snug comfy pair of hiking shoes/ boots and bring a camera. ("Pee" before you go.) The three mile hike to the falls is all easily downhill with lots of twists and turns on the slopes. Going back the three miles you came is, therefore, all uphill and slow going. Stay on the trail. If you're coming here in the summer, bring a gallon of drinking water with you or you will get heat stressed or, worse, heat stroked... A regular visitor told me that as early as Easter, the temperatures start moving up. Thus today was a great day to go. There is no cell phone signal here. You're in the hills in nature. It was fun. My child and I had...