Images by John 'K'

Just off Calaveras Road (see last blog entry) is the Sunol Regional Wilderness Park. Having spotted the entrance to the park while driving the road recently, I decided to take my wife there to kick off our somewhat belated new years resolution to go on regular weekend hikes. We’d had an earlier attempt at this while on our Pacific Coast drive in February, but hadn’t kept it up.

 

So we headed out in my little commute car (go-kart on steroids), and I started by taking her on the Calaveras Road drive itself. Unlike the times I’d driven it during the week, this time we encountered many modes of transport coming the other way – cars, motorbikes, cyclists – all out enjoying the lovely weekend we had. Many twisty miles later we turned onto the approach road to the park. After paying for entry (we really will have to look to get park membership if we’re going to do this regularly), we found our parking spot and started to head out to what we thought would be a nice introductionary hike in the park. After a couple of false starts picking up the start of the trail (my fault – never have a man do the map reading if there’s a woman who can do it for you!), we headed off up the Indian Joe Creek trail.

 

What we didn’t realise is that it was all up-hill. Ugh. A mile and a half of up-hill hike later, with encounters with lizards, frogs, butterflies and an occasional hiker with dog, we decided enough was enough, so we stopped at an interesting rock formation, had a little climb, sat and had a drink and a snack and just took in the view for a few minutes before we started back down towards the car.

 

It’s funny how even though you think you’re making good progress uphill, the downhill stretch is always quicker – perhaps because we didn’t keep stopping to look at everything that moved, and perhaps because we didn’t end up detouring off part way along because someone (NOT me this time) thought the trail went off to the left whereas it continued up the hill in front of us!, but whatever the reasons, we god down in about half the time.

 

While walking, we met a couple who had obviously been to this park a few times, and who pointed out that there were many more scenic trails, including one that takes in a waterfall. There’s also a section on one of the trails called ‘Little Yosemite’ so will be interesting to see how it compares with the real thing, so we’ll be back there again for sure. Just need to sort out that park membership first.

 

….and to whoever it was who left the plastic lizard on the rocks in the middle of the trail, thanks for giving us a laugh half way up the hill!

 

There are a few pictures in my photo album section.