Nordhoff Ridge Road

Tower Trail Camp

This camp and peak is a high point on the Nordhoff Ridge which is the range of mountains north of the town of Ojai. Charles Nordhoff, a featured writer for eastern papers, wrote in glowing terms of the area and the town when it was laid out in 1874. It was named after him in 1874 but in 1917 the town name was changed to Ojai. The U. S. Geological Survey named the peak in 1903 after the nearby town of the same name. The mountains are composed of Focene Age with formations named Juncal shale, Matilija sandstone, Cozy Dell shale and Coldwater sandstone. All of these formations are all what the geologists calI "overturned" meaning they are upside down with the younger rocks on the bottom and the old rocks on top.

A lookout tower was constructed in the 1930's and abandoned in the late 1960's or early 1970's. The cabin was removed so that now just the tower and a platform remain. The tower at camp provides an excellent spot from which to view the Upper and Lower Ojai Valley and all the way out to the ocean and beyond or north to the Sespe Valley and Pine Mountain.