We checked-in a day late at Lake Arrowhead Chalets on Monday January 19, 2004.. we had flown to San Diego the previous day from Chicago,...
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We checked-in a day late at Lake Arrowhead
Chalets on Monday January 19, 2004.. we had
flown to San Diego the previous day from
Chicago, arriving late in the afternoon... we
decided to spend the evening visiting with a
friend living in Carlsbad which was on the way
to the resort... our 21-day itinerary was to
spend a week each in Lake Arrowhead,
Carlsbad and Annaheim... we found
the drive along Interstate 15 between
Carlsbad and San Bernadino to be a barren,
unattractive, boulder strewn desert area and
heavily littered...
The registration office is off-site in the
village shopping center and we were
inconvenienced arriving at noontime only to
find the office locked and the sole resort
representive unavailable.. Lake Arrowhead is in
the San Bernadino National Forest which was
ground zero for the recent Fall forest
conflagration... the main road to Lake
Arrowhead was closed and detoured to
facilitate the clean-up activities... most of the
national forest facilities were likewise closed
because of unstable trail conditions and
concern for mud slides..
The 2-year drought conditions have spurred a
devastating infestation by a bark beattle,
killing many of the pines and exacerbating the
fire destruction.. currently, the once beautiful
mountain forest vista is an ugly, charred,
desolate area..
The weather was surprisingly mild with
temperatures in the 40-60'F range with no
snow... during our week's stay, Big Bear Lake
(about 25 miles away) had sufficient snow fall
to require tire-chains on the highway, the
need for which is an additional problem when
driving a rental car in mountainous regions...
Our accommodations included 2-bedrooms, a
full-kitchen, a large deck with gas grill, washer
& dryer facilities, a fireplace and 1 1/2-
bathrooms.. the 2-floor unit was large and
clean, but dark and dreary... the resort offered
few activities and sparse facilities... local
telephone calls are free and local dial-up
Internet access is available... a well
provisioned grocery store with reasonable
prices is available in the village center..
This would be an interesting and fun area with
warm weather or with winter activities, but the
combination of the between-seasons weather
and the forest-fire destruction resulted in a
unexciting visit...
Joe Tragesser