Big Basin is one of my favorite places to run. Established in 1902, it’s California’s oldest state park and features the largest continuous stand of old growth redwood forest (in square miles) south of Humboldt State Park (250 miles to the north). It’s only 1.5 hours away from the population centers of the Bay Area, but…
Category: Trail Running
Upper Huddart Loop
Huddart County Park in Woodside is my most frequent destination for running, but I enjoy it every time and it is one of my favorite places to run and hike. The trails are almost entirely under a lush canopy of redwood and hardwood forest. There are numerous nearby parks for expanded options, including Purissima Creek…
Garland Ranch Regional Park
Garland Ranch Regional Park is a 4,500 acre park near Carmel Valley and the northern end of the Santa Lucia Mountain Range. A variety of landscapes exist, including thick oak woodland, chaparral, grassland, and even a side canyon with redwoods. The canyons are lush and cool while the ridges are exposed and provide spectacular views of…
Salt Point and Sonoma Coast State Parks
[Note: A more recent trip to the Sonoma Coast with more photography here] Salt Point State Park is located about 2 hours north of the Golden Gate Bridge on the sparsely populated Sonoma Coast. The park features a rugged coastline and woodlands with an interesting mixture of redwoods, bishop pine, Douglas fir, oaks, and hardwoods…
2009 Adventure Run Recap
A recap of Adventure Runs in 2009 in chronological order: Thompson Peak: (June 17th) Located in the rugged Trinity Alps region of the Klamath Mountains, this climb entailed passing through the rugged glacier-carved Canyon Creek drainage with granite cliffs, waterfalls, and lovely alpine lakes. Mount Sill: (July 9th) Stellar views from the summit (known as…
Lots of Photos!
Over the past couple days I visited Salt Point State Park, the Sonoma Coast, Mount Tamalpais State Park, and several parks along Skyline Blvd. I watched two amazing sunsets, one on Mount Tamalpais and the other on Borel Hill in Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve. This flurry of activity was spurred by sunny skies and…
Sierra Azul Open Space Preserve
Sierra Azul is the largest preserve in the Midpenninsula Regional Open Space District covering over 17,000 acres of rugged and steep terrain (map). The region is on the east side of the Santa Cruz Mountains so the vegetation consists primarily of chaparral, bay trees, and oak woodland. The preserve is largely undeveloped and the trails…
Mountain Photography Highlights Slideshow
I have too much free time these days so I made a mountain photography highlights slideshow of some of my favorite mountain photos over the past five years. Unfortunately, I could not include some photos that are located on my old computer in Sammamish (I need high quality for the video), but I will add…
Snow on Skyline
The crest of the Santa Cruz Mountains seems to get snow at least once a year, but it’s still a rare enough occurrence that I get excited about it. On Monday, I drove up to Skyline Blvd. and found picturesque winter scenes after 2-3 inches of snow fell at the higher elevations that morning. Here…
Rose Peak Snow
I joined Gary Gellin for a 19 mile roundtrip hike up 3,817 ft Rose Peak in the Ohlone Wilderness. A rare snowstorm swept through the hills and mountains above 1,500 ft in the Bay Area and the objective was to see lots of snow and views. Our wishes came true with 6-8 inches of fluffy,…
Leor Pantilat's Adventures