Location: Marin (Lagunitas)

Distance: 5.3 miles

Entry fee: $0

This hike yielded some of the best flora and fauna to date.  And some of the most awesome views.  I am falling in love with Mt Tam.

Molly and I had originally planned to do the Cataract Falls hike in the same area.  We underestimated, however, the level of fun we would have the night before at Chrissy’s 29th birthday celebration (which started out at La Trappe…we should have known better).   So after a late start to the day and taking into account the puke probability, a 7 mile “moderate” hike did not sound appealing…or even really possible.  So we settled for the shorter, easier Phoenix Lake.

After driving through much of Marin (yes, we may have gotten lost on the way there), we pulled up to a line of cars waiting for a parking spot.  Wtf.  Lesson one: if you plan to do this hike, get there early.  We only ended up waiting about 5 minutes (during which we ate about half the birthday cupcakes we had baked for Chrissy the day before…we had them in the car with the good intention of delivering them on the way home.  Guess what didn’t happen.)  Anyway, we finally parked and got our hike on.

The fireroad at the early part of the hike has relatively heavy traffic…the area is very popular with mountain bikers, and the very beginning of the fireroad is full of families and dogs and people just enjoying a nice stroll around the lake.  Once you break off the fireroad onto Yolanda trail (which, surprise, we missed on the first flyby and had to backtrack to find), it empties out.

The first half of this hike is AWESOME.  To begin with, the day was beautiful.   The recent rain meant that all of the brooks and streams and waterfalls were flowing, and that the moss and mushrooms were all out and sporing (or whatever it is they do) making everything look soft and fuzzy and bright green and surreal.

We saw tons of birds (humming birds, robins, hawks, vultures–which freaked Molly out) and some really amazing views of the peak of Mt. Tam.  We also identified a few flowers and plants, including the invasive broom (duh duh duh) and bluedicks (I’m not going to say anything in case my parents read this site).

Once you complete that part of the loop, you hit the fireroad again and, after about 300 yards, branch off into what is essentially a small redwood forest.  While this part of the hike was less exciting (partially because we’ve spent a decent amount of time in redwood forests, partially because we were ready to get back to the car and eat more cupcakes) it was here that we saw some of our more exciting fauna, including: a huge banana slug (which, did you know, can weigh up to a quarter pound), and what we thought was a salamander but is actually a coast range newt.

(For all of you out there wondering what distinguishes a salamander from a newt…and I know you are….a newt is actually the common name for certain members of a family of relatively small salamanders.)

Hike #7: hungover success!  I know I said this about the last Mt Tam hike, but I really think THIS one might be my favorite so far.

Lessons learned: all newts are salamanders, but not all salamanders are newts

Flora and Fauna: California Bay tree, broom, coast range newt, banana slug, bluedicks (which are actually purple)

Location: Marin, Mill Valley

Distance: 4.7 miles (if you don’t get lost…for us, ~7 miles.  you can see where this is going.)

Entry fee: $0

Three of us set out for this hike early to make it home in time for the NFL playoffs.  We got to the parking lot at the trailhead and I…promptly locked the keys in the car.

After finding out it would take the tow truck almost an hour to make it into the boonies and get my keys out, we decided to head across the aptly-named Panoramic Highway to the Mountain Home Inn for some coffee.  Everyone was really happy with me.

An hour later we finally started hiking.  The trail (which was built by the boyscouts in 1931) almost immediately leads into some pretty dense foliage.  It was raining on and off the whole time, but the area was so wooded there were times that we barely noticed.

On the trail there are groves of baby redwoods, a lot of weird looking moss, waterfalls and streams, colorful mushrooms…it really is an awesome hike to do in the winter.  But get ready to get muddy.  There are a lot of things that will tempt you to test your physical prowess.  Like:

Tall trees:

Sideways trees:

Fallen trees:

…and branches suspended over ravines:

After about 2 hours Paul was starting to get antsy about making it home in time for the second game (we already had to sacrifice the first one because of the later start).  According to the book we had only gone 3.3 miles…it kind of felt longer, but since no one had an pedometer we really had no idea.  (As Molly put it, it felt like we were in a mileage warp).  After following a short stretch of the Muir Woods trail (which was amazing) we hit the Lost Trail, which we knew was the last section of the hike and only about 1 mile from the finish line.  Finally, we had a sense of security about where we were and how much further we had to go.  Enter: poor trail markings.

We BOOKED IT up some serious inclines, ready to be back at the car and get some food.  About halfway up the Lost Trail we hit an ambiguous clearing.  We paused for a second, considered a few options, then without much discussion continued hiking aggressively down what we thought was the right trail.  After 15 minutes, when we hadn’t seen the landmark that we were supposed to hit 0.3 miles after the clearing, I began to suspect that this “mileage warp” may be intrinsically linked to our inability to read a map.  20 minutes after the ambiguous clearing we ran into another hiker, who confirmed that yes, we had in fact been walking as fast as we could downhill for 20 minutes in the wrong direction.  Turn around.  20 more minutes back uphill to the clearing.  From there another 10 minutes steep uphill to the actual end of the trail.  Goddammit.

Hike #4: quasi-success (to be honest, in my opinion, this was the best hike we’ve had so far…if we didn’t spend a good portion of it feeling and being lost, it would have been even better)

This is a fantastic hike if you don’t want to go too far outside the city (only about 20 min away) and are up for a little exercise but nothing obscenely strenuous.  Exceptionally stunning views, lots of interesting vegetation.

Lessons Learned: bring a pedometer if you are on a tight schedule

Flora and Fauna: we saw a redwood that had sprouted a new trunk about 90 feet off the ground (this happens when the tops of redwoods break off as they mature.  More info here.)  It was pretty cool.

Location: East Bay, Walnut Creek

Distance: 5 miles

Entry fee: $0

For our first hike we decided to try a simple, short loop.  This area has a reputation of being hellishly hot and dry, so we figured the winter would be a good time to not only see a little more vegetation in the area, but also maybe catch one of the waterfalls which, as the placard at the trailhead put it, was the “ultimate goal” of our hike.

The beginning of the trail was relatively flat, following and eventually crossing over a babbling brook.  There are a variety of trails that branch off of each other, so following the right path proved to be trickier than anticipated.  About 20 minutes in, however, I had the directions torn from my hands by a fellow hiker (who will remain nameless) and was told I wasn’t “going to see nature if you have a piece of paper in front of your face, in the wilderness we just use the sun as a compass”.  So the paper was put away and from then on we relied on pure instinct to guide us.  45 minutes later we ended up in…guess where…the wrong place.

After trekking up some very steep hills, the team as a whole concluded that we were a.) no longer anywhere near any water sources, b.) hungry, and c.) lost, so we decided to call it quits.  Hike #1: failure.  But we did get some nice views and hit up some awesome bar-b-que at Kinder’s Meats & Deli on the way home, so it wasn’t a total loss.

Lessons learned: bring a map. Especially if you want to see the waterfalls.

Flora and Fauna: Manzanita tree, Madrone tree (which I got excited about…like Madrone Ventures….cool)