Three parks from the past

I've been working on building a landing page for all of the California State Parks that I have visited, and in sorting through the many parks of Northern California, I started to notice that there were several parks that I visited many years ago that have not made it into my blog. Although I do have photos from those trips, they are from older cameras and the quality of the images is not as good as the camera I am using now. So this is a single post to remember three trips from years past: 1) Armstrong Redwoods State Natural Reserve (in Guerneville), 2) Ed Z'berg Sugar Pine Point State Park (in Tahoe), and 3) Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park (in Big Sur). The photos are not as good as what I can do now, but the memories of these places sure are powerful and dear.

Armstrong Redwood State Natural Reserve

I visited this park with three very good friends from grad school when we had a girls' weekend in wine country over spring break in late March-early April of 2012. We stayed in Healdsburg and mostly kept to wine tasting, but I did convince the ladies that we should go for a hike one morning before we started tasting. So we made the short drive from Healdsburg to Guerneville to see this lovely park. We made a loop from the parking lot near Burbank Circle down on the Pioneer Nature Trail back towards the entrance kiosk and then up East Ridge Trail to the waterfall. Then down the ridge towards the volunteer office and maintenance area, where we rejoined the Pioneer Nature Trail and then over to the Armstrong Nature Trail and the Discovery Trail to see the Colonel Armstrong Tree and complete our loop.

The loop was about 3-3.5 miles and had some elevation gain, but nothing too, too serious.

It was a moderate but beautiful hike: the perfect way to start a day of wine-tasting. Although I want to come back here, it won't be the same without these wonderful ladies!

Ed Z'berg Sugar Pine Point State Park

This trip to Ed Z'berg Sugar Pine Point State Park happened in October of 2010, when my mom was visiting my husband and me back when we still lived in Sacramento. We made a day trip to Tahoe because my mom had either never been before or had not been in a very long time. I believe that we didn't really plan our trip out ahead of time, and we picked this park on a whim.

We got lucky, because it was a perfect place for our day trip: gorgeous views, fun hikes, and no crowds (in October).

My mom stayed by the lake shore, right by where General Creek emptied out into the lake, near the Hellman-Ehrman Mansion. She stayed back to do a pastel of the landscape (a photograph of her pastel is to the right). While she worked, my husband and I hiked the General Creek Trail to Lily Pond. You can access the trail either from the campground or from  the shoreline area of the park, and you can do an in-and-out hike or make a loop.

It's about 3 miles (maybe a little more) in either configuration, and the whole trail is quite flat.

If you start from the campground side, you will learn about the Olympic events that were hosted in this park during the 1960 Winter Olympics. I believe that this park might be visited more heavily in the winter by cross-country skiers, but in October it was just a peaceful, heavenly spot to visit. In my memory, we saw more beavers than people that day; who knows if my memory is at all accurate on this point. Maybe I will just have to return to verify if my memory is playing tricks on me and glossing over reality for fantasy.

Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park

Finally, this last trip down memory lane is of a camping trip that my mom, husband, and I had in July of 2009. We went to Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park in Big Sur, which served as our base to explore several other parks such as Julia Pfeiffer Burns and Andrew Molera.

Although I have been back to both of those parks since I started writing this blog (and I therefore have higher quality photos), I somehow have missed returning to photograph this lovely campground.

I do remember that we *loved* our campsite (site 41), and that we had a marvelous time exploring both the redwoods of the park and the Big Sur River, which went by our site.

While my mom stayed back to do a watercolor of the Big Sur River, my husband and I hiked the Valley View and Pfeiffer Falls Trail, which is an in-and-out trail that is about 2 miles round-trip.

The following is a description of the hike from the state park's website: Climb a moderate-strenuous 750 feet through a Redwood and Oak woodland to a fork in the trail. Take the left fork to the Valley View Overlook, where you will be rewarded with a tremendous view of the Big Sur River Valley, Pt. Sur and Andrew Molera State Park. Backtrack and take the right fork for a view of Pfeiffer Falls, a 60-foot waterfall.

The photos of the waterfall don't do it justice. I remember it being very lovely. And also, there had been a fire along the Valley View trail. As the landscape was bouncing back, it was transitioning through a chaparral stage--the exposed ridge was sunnier, warmer, and drier than I was expecting. And the views of Andrew Molera were specifically the views of beautiful Pico Blano. It was really cool to see it from a totally different angle than I am used to seeing.

It's hard to believe that this was over 10 years ago! I think it is going to be time to go camping again real soon. Especially if my daughter is starting to get the hang of it.