The Big Santa Anita Canyon Permittees’ Association (BSACPA) is holding their annual Cabin Owner’s Breakfast on Saturday, May 14, from 9am to 11am, at Adams’ Pack Station, Chantry Flat (at the top of Santa Anita Avenue/Santa Anita Canyon Road). The BSACPA is an organization of those who own cabins in the Canyon, works to keep trails maintained, and helps to educate the public to canyon safety.
This is the first year that the event has been open to the public. Cost is $9.50 for adults and $7.50 for children under the age of 10. The menu will consist of eggs, hash browns, sausage, veggie sausage, pancakes, fruit, juice, coffee, tea and all the fixings. Plates and utensils are supplied.
If you’ve hiked the Big Santa Anita Canyon and been curious about the cabins you’ve seen by the trail and nestled among the oak, bay, and alder trees along the trail, this is the opportunity to meet and speak with many of the cabin owners, as well as learn more about Adams’ Pack Station. These privately owned cabins were constructed individually from the 1890s through the mid-1920s. There are 81 still standing today, all that remain of the approximately 350 original cabins. They are privately owned, and under the terms of the Forest Service lease, the owners are not permitted to rent them.
Accessible only by foot, just as they were a hundred years ago, few have any of the modern amenities many of us take for granted, such as electricity, central heat, or piped-in water for example, or indoor plumbing. There is, however, the original telephone system of sorts that has been in operation for over sixty years: a single line hand crank 6-volt battery operated system that runs between Sturtevant Camp and Chantry Flat. It is not part of the modern worldwide communications network by any means.
Visitors to the canyon sometimes see pack animals being led along the trail. The pack station at Chantry Flat has been in business since the 1930s, hauling supplies in to the original mountain camps and the cabins by horse and mule train. This is the second pack station; the original one being in Sierra Madre, but when the road to Chantry Flat was constructed in the 1930s, that station was discontinued. Without a road in the upper canyon there is no other way to bring in or haul out large or bulky items. Visitors to the pack station can visit with the resident mules, goats, chickens, and barn cats.
There will also be a fund-raising raffle held at 10:30am for a variety of items donated by the cabin owners and friends of BSACPA. Tickets will be on sale at $1.00 each or 7 tickets for $5.00. Parking is available in one of the three Forest Service Lots (with an Adventure Pass).
Anyone interested in attending, please RSVP to BSACPA no later that May 9th at BSACPA_events@yahoo.com, or call Tina at (909) 770-5700, x247.
would like to purchase a cabin all cash