Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve

Sunshine and warm weather was the perfect setting yesterday for the final field trip for my Peninsula Parks & Trails class with the College of San Mateo.

We met at the Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve parking lot near the intersection of Skyline Boulevard and Alpine Road. We started our 5.5 mile saunter with a third of a mile loop around Alpine Pond in adjacent Skyline Ridge Open Space. We paused at the Ohlone mortar stone where women pounded acorns centuries ago.

After returning to the Russian Ridge parking lot, we headed north (uphill) on the Bay Area Ridge Trail and then made a left turn on the Ancient Oaks Trail. We saw numerous leafless buckeye trees displaying their fruit. Along the way some of us climbed an ancient canyon live oak beside the trail. Turning right on the Charquin Trail, we enjoyed the bright yellow fall foliage of big leaf maple trees. Along the Hawk Ridge Trail we stopped for lunch near two dead Douglas fir trees riddled with holes used by acorn woodpeckers to store acorns. Nearly every hole contained an acorn, and we saw several woodpeckers at work on their acorn cache.

After lunch we ascended the ridge to the Bay Area Ridge Trail and then headed south. We stopped to view Mindego Hill to the west. This hill is now part of Russian Ridge Open Space, and is expected to be open to the public next year. The high point of our hike was the summit of  2,572-foot

Borel Hill, named for nineteenth century banker Antoine Borel, a Swiss immigrant who once owned this property. From the summit, which is the highest named point in San Mateo County, we could see north to Mount Tamalpais in Marin County, east to San Francisco Bay and Mount Diablo, south to Mount Umunhum, and west to the Pacific Ocean. It was a perfect day for ridge top vistas.

TO GET THERE...from Highway 280, take Page Mill Road west (uphill) and look for the
Russian Ridge parking lot on the right just beyond Skyline Boulevard.

Juvenile Elephant Seals at Ano Nuevo State Park

Only the most intrepid or optimistic of my De Anza College students showed up as a steady rain fell on the Ano Nuevo State Park parking lot yesterday morning. Undaunted by the weather we started our outing with a stop at the visitors center museum in the old dairy barn. From there we headed west toward the point.

Our optimism was soon rewarded as the rain stopped and blue sky and sunshine prevailed for the rest of the day. Our first stop was the reservoir which sits in the little rift valley along the Frijoles Fault. We were surprised to find a few red Indian paintbrush still in bloom. We headed up a sand dune and paused to examine an ancient Indian shell mound left by the Quiroste band of Ohlone Indians centuries ago.  Further on we saw several deer.

At North Point we saw hundreds of juvenile elephant seals lounging on the beach, and a few pre-pubescent males practice battling for dominance. These youngsters arrive at this time of year to molt and build bone density when they have the beach to themselves before the mature bulls arrive in December. A knowledgeable docent on the viewing platform educated us about the life cycle of these amazing seals. With binoculars we were able to see sea lions on the island and a mother sea otter with her baby. Brown pelicans were common.

Because eating isn't allowed in the natural preserve part of the park, we headed to Cove Beach, just south of the reservoir, for a late lunch. Here you can observe the abrupt change in rock in the sea cliff where it is bisected by the Frijole Fault. After lunch we enjoyed bay nut brownies and then headed back to the parking lot.

TO GET THERE... The main entrance is on the west side of Highway 1 about 19 miles north of Santa Cruz and about 23 miles south of Half Moon Bay.