A Nice Vigorous Hike: Purisima Creek

by Skimming

Since moving to our new place, we’ve been trying to find some good places to hike. Hiking in the Peninsula in the Bay Area is very different from hiking in the East Bay. It’s hotter, more exposed, and browner, I find. I’m missing the East Bay hikes (Tilden Park, Wildcat Canyon, etc.). But we’re determined to find something!

So we found Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve. Bay Area Hiker is a great website for finding hikes in the Bay Area, and this suggested hike was quite nice. We found it easily, and though the parking lot was crowded on a late Saturday morning in the fall, we were able to park on the side of the road. This is listed as an easy hike, but we noted that the description says there is a 1200 foot decline and and then the loss is regained, so it ended up being more of a moderate hike, I’d say. We worked up quite a sweat because it was pretty warm for a fall day (in the 70s) and in the direct sun it was almost hot.

Some of the nice aspects of the trail was that it goes through forest and then hits open space. There are some really nice views of the bay at the beginning of the trail and then of the ocean later on. You can see Half Moon Bay at a point.

The hike description talks about an open space for a picnic, but it was just too hot that day to stop there, so we went down the trail about another quarter mile or so and found another clearing that was temporarily shaded. At least it was shaded for long enough for us to have a nice picnic lunch.

The North Ridge Trail ends; it’s not a loop. I think we’ll be back to this area for more hikes in the future.