The Five-Peak Challenge of Mission Trails Regional Park

The Five-Peak Challenge of Mission Trails Regional Park in San Diego is our to-go-to cardio workout place! The park is huge, it encompasses 8,000 acres of some of the small mountains of San Diego. There are over sixty miles of trails in the park – some paved, but most are well-maintained dirt and rocky trails. Some of the mountain trails have wood or rock steps dug into the trails.

Within Mission Trails Regional Park there are trails to five of the peaks and the city parks department has set up the Five-Peak Challenge. The five peaks and their heights are:

Mountain Peak	Elevation (feet)	Elevation (meters)
Cowles Mountain	1,592	485
Pyles Peak	1,379	420
Kwaay Paay	1,194	364
South Fortuna	1,094	333
North Fortuna	1,291	393

The heights by themselves are not too impressive; however, you are starting out at close to sea level. As part of the five-peak challenge, you can hike the peaks in any order and in as many days as you would like. The official requirements are that you stay on the designated trails and that you get a picture of yourself (selfies are fine) or of your group at the mountain top.

Our Five-Peak Challenge

Our first hike to one of the mountain tops was up to the top of Cowles Mountain before we knew about the challenge. We did the hike to the top a year ago and learned about the five-peak challenge. We thought that was a great idea and then did not do anything about it!

After the quarantine and travel lockdown, we started hiking the park four-to-five times a week and after a couple of conditioning hikes made it to the top of the first peak – North Fortuna for our new goal of doing the five-peak challenge.

We have added two more peaks to the challenge – South Fortuna as well as Kwaay Paay since the first one. These are great cardio workouts and have awesome views all around! The remaining peaks will mostly be done on the same hike – you cannot get to Pyles Peak without taking the same trail up to Cowles Mountain. We are not in any hurry to complete them, but plan on doing so in the next month or so. In the meantime, we have made several more trips to the top of both South Fortuna and North Fortuna.

Old Mission Dam

One other attraction at the park is the Old Mission Dam. The dam was built over a three-year time period of 1813 – 1816, mostly by Native American laborers for the Spanish Mission San Diego de Alcala. The dam is built on the San Diego River and provided drinking water and irrigation for crops at the mission. The trail to the Old Mission Dam is mostly paved, and you can go for a leisure hike or bike ride from the Visitor’s Center to the dam.

Wildlife in the Park

There is a lot of different wildlife within the park boundaries. Almost everyday we see rabbits, ground squirrels, different birds flying around, ducks in the lakes, and lizards along the trails. Some of the other not as common wildlife we have seen is snakes – including rattlesnakes (on different occasions), deer occasionally, roadrunners, and one time we saw a bobcat at dusk! It is always amazing to see these animals within the city and makes the hikes so much more enjoyable.

For More Information…

Check out the Mission Trails Regional Park website at: https://mtrp.org and if you live nearby or visit San Diego, be sure to add the park to your list of places to visit!