Big Basin Trails

If there was a little less sun in california then it would have been an ideal place for hiking. But on a saturday morning, with nothing useful to do, not in mood to go to crowded San-Francisco, you can't blame on Sun and stay at room watching US election forcasts. So me, Ravi and Viraj went out for a trip to nearby "Big basin Redwood parks". The name speaks everything. It is a vally surounded by mountains and covered by 200-300 ft. redwood trees. We stated from Freemont through San Jose on the way to Santa Cruz. It took us about one and half hours to reach there. From big basin Santa Cruz beach is just 50 miles. Basically you are supposed to see the pacific from a certain point in Big basin!


We left from Freemont after having breakfast. So there was no delay on the road except a couple where I stopped them to take some photos (they must have been fed up with me). The road towards the Park office, from where all the trails start, is a little bit elevated. But the road is very well maintained and the bikers use it as a race track! So if you are not driving then it's pretty amazing to see 1000cc bikes zoom in from behind and then zoom out. Of course if you are in the steering wheel you have to struggle to stay out of there way.

There are many trails (more than a dozen) that start form the Park Office and are categorized according to easy, moderate and strenuous. We unanimously decided to take a moderate trail. Our first plan was to take Sunset Trail to Berry Creek Falls Trail to Skyline to the Sea Trail Loop Trail. But the Berry Creek Falls trail was closed for the day. As a result we were suggested by the office to take the Skyline to Sea Trail followed by Meteor Trail, Creeping forest Trail and Dool Trail. The total length of our root came to be about 6 miles and it took us 3.5 hrs to come back to the base. One suggestion as any other hiking I would like to mention is to take LOTS of water. Otherwise you will repent.

For most part the trails were through jungle. Only after the Skyline to sea trail we went to a clearing at about 3000ft height from where pacific could be seen. All other trails were never able to see sunlight due to huge Redwood trees. The Creeping forest Trail still reminds of some old earthquake. The trees in this 1 mile stretch are all at a non-perpendicular angle with respect to the ground. Following are some pics that I took during the trek. Too sad I didn't have a DSLR to take the bird pics :(