While it is not always the case, rain on the coast can occasionally turn our East County mountains into a winter wonderland. From the reports it looked like Mount Laguna was getting a fair amount of snow so I decided to drive up with Oliver to check out some of the less popular areas.

We fired up the old Landcruiser and merged south onto the 5 freeway as the morning commuters zipped by us.

Top speed, or should I say comfortable speed for the Landcruiser is right under 65 mph which doesn’t always sit well with drivers hellbent on getting from point a to point b as quickly as possible. Suffice it to say I try to sit over in one of the slow lanes, sipping on my coffee, trying my best not to get run into ?.

An hour later Oliver and I were bumping across the cattleguard which marks the beginning of the forest service road we would be exploring. The service road is in marginal shape and there are heavily rutted sections so I locked the manual hubs and shifted the Landcruiser into 4-wheel drive.

Snow covered the road as we ventured further into the backcountry and sensing Oliver’s anxiousness to get out and explore I found a pullout and parked.

On account of this this being a weekday morning along with the semi-remoteness of the location we had our new found snow playground all to ourselves. ❄⛄First things first, a quick fetch session with Oliver’s favorite Chuck-it ball was in order, followed by a hike up the remote snow covered road.

There was not a footprint to be seen until we headed back and retraced our own steps. By this time, Oliver had succumbed to cold feet so it was time to head back to the coast and warmer climes.

Next time I will bring his booties although they never seem to stay on his paws anyway. ??