I am an East Coast girl and will always be an East Coast girl. But now that I’ve moved to the West Coast I’ve started to adapt a little bit to the California lifestyle. And this lifestyle consists of spending weekends hiking, camping, doing some water related activity…basically spending time outdoors in nature. I must say I’m enjoying these new found activities. More importantly, they’re helping me to de-stress.
In the northeast you spend 7 months of the year buried under layers of clothing and like the Punxsutawney Phil emerge out of your burrow only in the summer time. So growing up my family and I never spent much time doing outdoor activities. I loved going for runs in the park or playing Tennis outside but hiking and camping were never really our thing.
Now that I’ve moved to the Bay Area and my husband is a bit obsessed with these activities, I’ve started to embrace them too. Camping I’m still really iffy about… sleeping in a tent and not showering makes me feel ikky but hiking is a lot of fun. I generally enjoy being amongst people. I’m a city girl after all — having lived in NYC for close to a decade from the age of 17. While hiking and being in nature are calming and stress relieving, I find that the activity very isolating. The feeling of being alone is very uncomfortable to me. Short hikes 10-15 miles I could do as long as I run into people on the trail every so often but if I had to go hiking without seeing a single soul, I would lose my mind.
I love hikes where there are lots of trees thus plenty of shade with gradual inclines. I’ve hiked trails in Mt. Tamalplais State Park, Big Basin Red Woods State Park, Mission Peak, and Angels Island.
The most scenic but easy hike was Angel Island. This tiny island which you can only access via a ferry is has 360 degree views of San Francisco, Alcatraz Island, Sausalito, and Berkeley & Oakland. The Sunset trails leads directly to the top of Mt. Livermore where you can have a nice picnic while enjoying the beautiful scenery.
Our Mt. Tam hike was unexpected as we were planning to go to Sonoma for a July 4th day trip. I actually hiked in a skirt. Yep that happened! The views from the top were amazing. We didn’t make it all the way to the top and drove close to the summit but the views of San Francisco and the surrounding area was amazing. To top it off there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the sun was shining brightly. My perfect kind of day.
My most difficult hike so far has been Mission Peak. The hike is pretty steep – about 2,000 feet climb in about 3 miles. I huffed and puffed (and sat down on the ground at one point) for 2.5 hours on my way to the summit. We also went in the middle of a hot day which is the worst time to go. I would definitely hike the trail again but next time highly recommend going in the early morning before the sun bears down you with so much anger that you’ll be tan for months!. Also, bring lots of H2O. It’s your friend.
My longest hike was the 10 mile Berry Creek Loop trail at Big Basin Redwood State Park. The hike was serene surrounded by Redwood trees culminating in a scenic waterfall. The view from the top of the expansive Redwood forest was well worth the 10 mile hike. Highly recommend this hike to newbies looking to stretch themselves and get acquainted with nature.
I’m looking forward to spending more time outdoors, the benefits of which are both better mental and physical wellbeing.
So get off that couch, log out of Netflix, and go for a hike!