Happy October, friends! If you’re heading to Julian or Wynola soon to get your fixings of apples, pie, cider, and all things fall, we suggest stopping by the Volcan Mountain County Preserve for a hike. At the trailhead, you will be greeted by a James Hubbell sculpture.

Just after the Volcan Mountain Preserve Foundation was incorporated in 1988, James Hubbell painted a watercolor of the mountain that he had made into a poster that was sold to raise money for the infant organization.

Once the first 220 acres had been secured for public use in 1989, the Board asked James Hubbell to design an entrance to the trail on the west face of the mountain that would celebrate the passageway to the 5,353’ summit and cause people to pause and appreciate that they were entering a special place. In 1990, with local volunteers, James built a beautiful gateway of native rock and cedar beams collected from and milled on nearby Palomar Mountain.

Using James’s design, his son Brennan built the tall iron sculptures in front of the gateway. Bill Porter added the organic metalwork on the back and Mirko Mrakajic carved creatures on the massive wooden beams. James and stonemason Vincent Guerrero trained volunteers to build walls and a kiva-like seating area with native stone gathered from nearby streambeds and road cuts. The group worked every Sunday morning for over a year to complete the project.

Volcan Mountain is a truly special place to the locals in the area, among them, the Hubbells. Volcan is the source of so much of James Hubbell’s art – it is full of life, beauty, and unobstructed views of the stars. Thank goodness Anne Hubbell and other Julian residents banded together to preserve this valuable resource when they founded the Volcan Mountain Foundation in 1988.