#77 El Corte de Madera Creek Open Space Preserve

It's been almost two weeks since the last time I got out to do a hike, and high time! I spent most of New Year's weekend laying around at Chez Commanda while watching Star Trek and eating ice cream. On Sunday I applied for jobs and then decided to go to the gym, but when I got to my car, Alack! The battery was dead. My neighbor jumped it for me, and it started right up, so then I drove down 280 for a while to charge it up.

Since I didn't get to go to the gym yesterday, and since I had discovered where highway 280 is, I decided it was definitely time for another hike from my book. I decided to head down the peninsula and check out the El Corte de Madera Creek Open Space Preserve.

I did the Tafoni and Fir Trail loop as suggested. This allows one to visit all the highlights of the area, including the awesome Tafoni formation, a pretty vista point, chaparral, a creek, and giant redwoods.

I had a dream about mountain lions last night, and then saw this sign at the trailhead. Unfortunately, I didn't see any mountain lions to FIGHT BACK against.

The trail gets off to a pretty start:

It's readily apparent that many of these trails are a favorite of mountain bikers. This makes the trail extra muddy at times, so I was glad I had worn my trail sneakers. Some of the fire road trails are great for running as well, but others would be too precarious.

I was intrigued by the steam coming off of this stump.

Next, I made my way on to the tafoni.

Tafoni is sandstone that has eroded in a cool way to form lattice-like structures and other neat formations. The second image on the wikipedia page I linked to is a picture of the tafoni I visited today. It's a lot sexier in that pic than in my iPhone pics below. The tafoni was huge! <3 Geology <3

After the tafoni I continued down the trail until I got to the creek trail. The roundtrip total for this hike is around 5–7 miles (the book and the trail map seem to differ). The creek trail was very pretty, and there are lots of beautiful redwoods. I couldn't really see the creek, however.

At this point it was about 3 in the afternoon and I had had only 350 calories and very little water. I had been hoping to find a convenience store on my way, but there is nothing out that way. One of the things I love about San Francisco is how easy it is to quickly get out of the city and feel like you're in the country. But today that worked against me as I hiked for 3 hours without food. So for a lot of the Creek Trail I was thinking about what I would eat when I was done. Don't get me wrong though, the creek trail had its charms.

I love chaparral, and was excited to finally start climbing up into it, knowing that this meant I was closer to food. And to the vista point! I could finally see the ocean! Or was it the sky? The horizon was very difficult to discern.

After the wonderful view I quickly descended down and found my way back to my car. I had a great time on the hike, and it was very beautiful. How excellent is it to be able to enjoy a green, lovely forest in the middle of winter? The temperature was about 50 degrees, the sun was out in parts, and the forest was largely my own. Gorgeous. I would definitely return to show a friend the tafoni and the view.

And don't worry, I got to eat, finally. I hit up Rainbow Pizza and Tasty Treats in the Crystal something plaza in San Mateo. Yum! I still need more water though. I always do.