landscapes

Pleasanton Ridge regional park - Castleridge

This has been a busy weekend with a lot of yoga doubles and a nice hike.. there was also some singing involved! Busy but happy..

The hike was in Pleasanton ridge regional park from the Castleridge trail head. We did an 8+ mile loop which took us ~4 hours. We did good time given it just keeps going up in the initial part of the hike. It was an hours drive almost for us to get to the trailhead and given it was post lunch, starting the steep climb was a slow affair.

We saw a lot of hare, turkey, deer, red tailed hawks and frogs today!

Could have waited another 5 mintues after reaching the top. There was a solitary bench right after we managed to have tea standing up and trying to juggle tea and bhajjis, standing up.

we kept clicking as we walked today!

It was good we didn’t stop much today. Managed to come down before it got dark. As a treat to ourselves, we stopped at Thirupathi Bhimas and refilled four time he calories we burned on the hike in 1/4th the time!

Here are the nature pics from the hike..

There were like 10 frogs that surrounded my feet when getting close to the water to take this shot. Lots of frogs! First time seeing them up close in these numbers!

and a short video highlights reel.

While San and our friends would like to visit this again, I am not. Great trails, amazing views etc.. but there is a section of the trail where one big tree has fallen and there are another 3-4 trees in this section that could fall anytime! Not a big fan of trails which are not maintained well. After a lady lost her life because of a falling tree in our local park last year, very hesitant to go through trails like this!

Did enjoy the hike thoroughly today!

Revisiting Foothill Park after 4 years

The anniversary trip posts have to wait for this brief interruption

Given this is a long weekend, we decided to revisit foothill park in Palo Alto this afternoon. This park is just 25 minutes from our place. The first time we got to visit it was in 2021 sundar72.com/travelog/2021/1/4/a-lost-world-foothills-park-palo-alto.html?rq=foothillwhen covid was still in peak. We were wearing masks and walking.

We went in the afternoon because I had to do two back to back yoga classes this morning. Got an hour and a half post yoga class to get something to eat, drink lot of fluids and join the gang on a 9 mile hike this time.

Parking is available for 6$ right inside the park. We started hiking at 2PM and were out by 5:30. It was pleasant. There was a lot of water in the creek and falls and there was hardly anyone else in the park.

Our little one joined us for this hike as well and that was a bonus..

We caught some sunset colors right when we reached the top. So for a change, a front facing bench photo to start this post..

A gallery of portrait format pics..

We were also treated today to some amazing Bajji after walking in the cold.. to go with Chai.. our hiking group leader made my day!

A video highlights reel of the hike..

Exhausted after all that exercise all day, but feeling good!

Will definitely recommend this place for an afternoon hike in cool weather!

Red Tail trail to Arastradero Lake

This weekend we hiked to a place that we have missed all these years. Right here in Palo Alto there is the Enid Pearson Arastradero Preserve with 10+ miles of trails and a cute and beautiful lake in the middle of it.

We also happened to pick a beautiful morning to hike here. The skies were just lit yesterday!! The sunbeams and purple clouds were a treat to the eyes!

There were lots of benches in the park..

that is probably our most beautiful “bench photo” to date ! The rest from this trail are here.. including a few cheesy ones of us making a heart. I was upset with San on the way to the park.. so our friends were giving me a hard time for being so finicky.. At times my OCD tendencies get the better of me. She is my world and I cannot stay mad at her for more than 3 minutes tops. At this point I am pretty much her pet dog or something like that.. <vent>still one needs to fold all other fingers in when making the heart and it has to be presented parallel to the plane of the camera.. </vent"> (that should be a legit html tag!)

Not possible to be angry with this one..

A few vertical shots of this lake..

A gallery of pictures of the beautiful skies and landscapes from the days hike.. We hiked only 6 miles as I had to do some unplanned last minute singing with the local Smule group! It was a packed day of activities for a regular saturday!

Surprisingly did not take any videoclips on this hike!

We will definitely revisit this place and cover the few trails that we missed within this park. The bay area is just amazing. There are still a lot of trails we haven’t hiked, given we hike new trails all the time.

Every year there is a well planned long grand hike. Last years highlight was the grand canyon! Hoping this years grand hike will be something to write about!