For my birthday last month, my mom and I traveled north to Mendocino for a girls weekend. We had the perfect get away filled with nature, great food and adventures. We stayed at the Heritage House, which had amazing views of the ocean and the largest bathtub that I had ever experienced. We went on two great hikes to the Van Damme State Park and the Jug Handle Natural Reserve. Most excitingly there was a very friendly goat on the trail who had gotten loose from a local farm. We had a delicious dinner at Cafe Beaujolais.
Point Reyes
Last weekend, we planned on going to the Muir Woods, but our plans were foiled! In order to avoid overcrowding, Muir Woods now requires that cars reserve a parking spot before visiting the park. Since we found this out right before leaving, we quickly re-purposed our plans and instead went to Point Reyes.
Point Reyes is a park a half hour further than Muir Woods, with incredible cliff views. We intended to take a 13 mile route to see a waterfall on the beach, but were not able to find the correct path. We instead hiked to a beautiful view, and saw the waterfalls from the top.
There are countless other trails, so we will definitely be back.
Big Basin Redwoods State Park
Yesterday, we drove down to Boulder Creek, California, and went on a five mile hike in Big Basin Redwoods State Park. After a stressful few weeks, it was great to get out of our routines and into nature. The redwood trees were incredible, and we had a picnic overlooking the Pacific Ocean. There are even more hikes that I would like to explore, but this time we created our own loop from the Dool Trail to the Meteor Trail. I've decided that I need to hike more often, so hope to be back again soon.
16th Ave Tiled Steps
When I first came to San Francisco for job interviews, I had a jam packed week and needed to schedule an hour to unwind. After some Pinterest browsing, I came across the 16th Avenue Tiled Steps and added it to my itinerary.
The 16th Avenue steps were built in 2005 by Irish ceramist Aileen Barr and mosaic artist Colette Crutcher, and were paid for by 220 residents. There are a total of 163 separate mosaic panels created, one for each step riser, made of over 2,000 handmade tiles and 75,000 fragments of tile, mirror and stained glass.
If you climb to the top of the stairs and then go up two other stair cases, you come to Grandview Park, with 360 degree views of the city. You can see the Pacific Ocean, Golden Gate Park, the Financial District, and, if you it's a very clear day, can even see the Golden Gate Bridge.
Windy Hill Trail
Once we found out that we were going to be living in a hotel for the foreseeable future, the husband and I decided to take advantage of the beautiful day and go on a hike. As a New Englander, I'm used to a few hiking options, but here in California there are more trails than there are days in the year!
We ended up driving to Windy Hill, a Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST) trail in Portola Valley. The preserve has a total of 12 miles of trails, but we ended up creating our own loop of about 6 miles.
The view from the top of Windy Hill was beautiful- we could see North all the way to San Francisco and South all the way to San Jose. It was great to be outside in nature and was the perfect de-stresser.
What is your favorite hike?
