Lady Waterman's Peak Rock Climbing
Elevation: 6,200' - 8,000'
Seasons: 🌸, ☀️, 🍁
By surface area this is the largest area on this website.
Three Points/Waterman Trail - Park here and take the Waterman trail past Fictitioua Tree to climb boulders on the west side of Waterman Mountain. This area is also good in the winter ❄️.
Camp Valcrest/John Henge - Just after Camp Valcrest is a long straightaway. To your left, John Henge, and to your right, all the way up to the 6,000' gate (and beyond) is Waterman Mountain ridge line. Park at any of the turnouts after the camp and head south east up your choice of steep, chossy, mountain lion scat filled gullies (600-800' elevation gain, most of the rocks are above 6,600'), to get to small rope crags and boulders.
6,000' Gate/Double Delight - The 6,000 foot gate area has a bathroom! It also has a winding old road that turns in to trail. The main trail leads to Double Delight and then the Summit. From the 6,000' gate to Double Delight is about 1.96 miles and +1,261' elevation gain. The Switchback Boulders are around 0.6 miles from the 6,000' gate parking area.
The Waterman Ski area and Waterman Summit also have bouldering. You can park at Waterman Ski "Resort" and either slog up the main ski runs under Chair 1, or wind your way up the blue runs "Deer Tracks" and "Ridge Run" to the summit (Alternatively you can take the main trail from the Buckhorn Day Use parking area). The easy way up is about 1.58 miles with +1,017' gain. But you don't have to go all the way to the summit, there are some boulders down low too.
Map
The Name
"Named according to USFS tradition after Robert B. Waterman (n.d.), pioneer mountain man and a Ranger in the San Gabriel Forest Reserve (1904-M). Waterman, together with his wife Liz, and their friend Perry Switzer, completed a three week hike from La Cañada to Antelope Valley and back again (May 1889). With this epic feat, Liz became the first woman known to have crossed the San Gabriels. Along the way, she placed a cairn on this summit and it was thus christened Lady Waterman's Peak. However, then current attitudes toward the "weaker sex" didn't deem this a fitting name.
A few years later, Ranger Philip Begue built the first trail to this summit from Newcomb's Camp (1903). This area was first developed for recreational skiing by Lynn Newcomb who built the first single tow rope (1939), and the first single seat chairlift (1941). He wrote that "in those days you weren't hamstrung by environmentalists or the Forest Service, the Rangers just asked you 'where do you want to put it?'"
Angeles Forest Supervisor Simeri E. Jarvi died of a heart attack while climbing this peak (1964).
The peak has subsequently been called by different variants, all of which leave out the "Lady". To his credit Robert Waterman made numerous futile efforts to have the full original name restored." -Summit Signature's - 14A Waterman Mountain