Posts Tagged ‘hiking’
Spring walks on the coast
Our coastal parks are either Redwoods or beaches or clifftops by the beaches. The trails may skirt the Pacific ocean or start off at the sea level and climb up an adjacent cliff, or climb up the Santa Cruz mountains.
This spring, after a lot of deliberation, we bought a convertible, a car that my spouse and I have discussed with adoration for the last three decades. We now are proud owners of a little two seater, a Miata. It feels purpose built for the mountain roads that separate the valley from the Pacific coast. We have been walking the mountain trails these last several years, but now the drive to the trailhead is part of being out in nature. Driving in a convertible is the equivalent of walking in nature. You can hear the birds, smell the petrichor and be awash in the dappled sunlight. Much like I deliberate over the trail properties, now I deliberate over the drive properties. Is the road narrow or twisty enough to allow us to slow down? Is there an alternate county road to the highway? Will the road give the Miata bumper a chin rash?
Post Miata, a number of our hikes have started off on the coast. One stayed on the beach, one climbed into the Redwood forest, and a few that climbed the dead cliffs covered with scraggy vegetation.
7 hikes, 35 miles, a ramble on rambles
A winter ramble
I was feeling restless this Monday. Even though it was a working day, I decided to go out on a short afternoon hike. Further inland from where we are, the tule fog had descended on the central valley and was squatting for solid 3 weeks and counting. Here in the Bay Area, the sun was up, but it didn’t carry warmth. The morning dew was still lingering and I noticed spider webs. There were so many that the grassland looked covered in dandelion tufts. I go to this park often, I am sure I have been over couple dozen times in the last three years and the web tufts managed to surprise and delight me.
The grassland itself presented diversity this early in the winter – the fallen leaves, dry grass from last season, new generation of grass, moss and other shrubs existed side by side. I chose a trail I take less often and came across a large deer family and this afternoon, they chose not to run away upon seeing me. Later, on the same trail, I found my local oyster mushroom foraging patch!
Read the rest of this entry »The fascinating Sitka spruce
I recently heard a joke and this is how it goes: “What do you do if you are lost in the Icelandic forests?” You just stand up!
Downy birch (Betula pubescens) was the backbone of Iceland’s native forests. It covered 20% of Iceland prior to Norse settlement in 9th century. Over harvesting and free range sheep grazing has left Iceland devoid of its native forests. While Iceland appears beautiful to a visitor and is on bucket list of every hiker, Iceland’s soil erosion is described as catastrophic. The seedlings that come up against the soil quality odds have a further hard time surviving sheep grazing. Those that do survive struggle to grow into trees with a vertical form and grow as shrubs instead. In places where reforestation is afoot, Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis) are coming to rescue. The Sitka spruce can withstand far adverse conditions than the native birch, including standing up to coastal salt and high wind. So, they are being planted first and when they mature, the more delicate species are grown in the nooks protected by Sitka spruce. To learn more about Iceland’s reforestation challenges, go on to watch “How do you grow trees in a treeless land?” (link)
For me, Sitka spruce is a memory switch. It reminds me of a trip to Alaska where I had fly-fished for salmon standing in waist deep glacial waters while watching a bear mom catch salmon for her two toddlers.
Soon after I had seen the Sitka spruce first hand, Gordon Hempton had referred to Sitka Spruce as nature’s largest violin. Gordon describes the recording event on his website: “I’ve positioned my microphone system that replicates 3-D human hearing inside a giant Sitka spruce log. This tree grew in the nearby rain forest and then floated down the Bogachiel River before coming to a rest (temporarily) at Rialto Beach. The wood of this tree species has special properties that make it ideal for crafting violins, guitars, and other acoustic instruments because the wood produces a sound when exposed to the slightest vibration. But here, instead of a bow drawn across violin strings, the sound of distant surf is powerful enough to cause this Sitka log to produce its own deep, harmonic concert.”
He had shared with some of us the sound this violin produces. I am musically challenged, to me it had sounded more like united heartbeats of creatures that had congregated by the ocean, hearts fluttering in mild anxiety, in heightened anticipation…
Enchanting dogwoods by the waterfalls
I adore dogwood tree flowers. Perhaps because the tree in my backyard only blooms for a month. And it does so in early spring, even before the tree bears leaves. It the middle of the green of spring foliage in the yard, the bright white flowers of dogwood look like stars, more so during dawn and dusk. The Pacific Dogwood, aka Mountain Dogwood, are native to the area around Mount Shasta. Catching the Shasta-Trinity region is early spring has also meant that the dogwood is in bloom. It is one thing to have a tree or two in bloom and it is entirely another to walk a trail where dogwood trees are blooming everywhere. It doesn’t hurt if the trail is by a river, and the river is gushing with newly melted snow.
Read the rest of this entry »A deeply satisfying walk
Yesterday, we visited Henry Coe State Park, after a span of nearly 18 years. It was a deeply satisfying early spring hike, with seasonal creek crossings, lunch by a lake, and sighting of abundant early blooms.
Henry Coe is second largest State Park in California at 89,000 acres. The bigger one, Anza Borrego, is over six times larger at 600,000 acres. Starting from Henry Coe HQ, we followed the Monument trail to Hobb’s road, met with the seasonal Little Coyote Creek for the first time on our way to Frog lake, had lunch at Frog lake while watching a large family fishing, then followed the Frog lake trail to Middle Ridge trail, then Fish trail to another Little Coyote Creek crossing, all the way to Corral trail and back to HQ.
Read the rest of this entry »A lookback at 2024
Last year, the afternoon of the 31st, our cruise ship had landed on the Half Moon island of the South Shetland Islands in the Antarctic peninsula. A lot happened in 2024, I was expecting it to feel like a long year (link to Radiolab episode The Secret to a Long Life), but that didn’t happen.
Read the rest of this entry »A new year hike on the Ice
I am no stranger to hiking through poor visibility (Mindego Hill, San Bruno). The sensory deprivation where you disengage and simply focus on the action of walking can bring mental quiet and a new appreciation of an otherwise familiar environment. Here on Antartica, the environment is brand new. Walking on snow and ice with the bulky jacket, boots, and life vest was proving to be an act of controlled slipping while alternately sweating and freezing. There was no rookery at the site, which meant no guano and no smell. Photographs were already proving to be difficult due to lack of familiar objects that define the scale of the environment, like the trees or rivers. So don’t judge. Here is what the camera saw over the course of a two mile hike, climbing perhaps 200 ft.
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Locomotoring 