La Vereda del Monte – Readings from Frank Latta’s book- Joaquin Murrieta and his Horse Gangs –

The trail begins northeast of Mt Diablo, at the rodeo grounds near Kellog Creek, and runs along the Diablo range all the way to Sonora, Mexico. According to Latta – ‘Murrieta and his horse gangs and to nearly all Californios…this became known as La Vereda del Monte, the mountain trail…over which Murrieta and his horse gangs hazed more than 8,000 horses, over 800 miles to their secret rancho in Old Mexico’

The photo below is along Los Gatos Creek, following the San Benito Mts where Murrieta had his ‘hideout’, Joaquin Rocks – in reality it was one of a series of staging grounds, or Esatciones, used to corral the horses before continuing east to Tulare Lake, then through the Tejon Pass.

I was unsuccessful in finding a back road up to the rocks, which is about five miles straight off the highway. Instead I had to take a much longer route, a few weeks later, after getting a permit to cross BLM land