Big Basin Ride

Today, I decided to take a Mountain Bike ride into Big Basin Redwoods State Park. I entered on the Skyline to the Sea trail from the Highway 1 side. This morning, I read in the Chronicle that several mudslides had closed the trail earlier in the year. Finally last week, they were able to re-open the trail. Lucky me! I had thought about riding this trail a few months ago, but it was either raining or had just finished raining. Today was the first day that I could make this ride.

It was overcast, but still a very pretty ride. There were hardly any people in this area of the park. I did not see a person until about halfway through the ride when I passed a backpacker. It was around noon and I was the only person that he had seen all day as well.


Most of the ride is along Waddell Creek. Due to the recent rains, the stream has plenty of water running down it. I really enjoy being in the forest near running water. I find it to be very calming.






I was worried that the trail would be really muddy or that there would be mudslides, but it was pretty dry most of the way. Occasionally, I would run into a big mud field that completely covered the trail and I would walk the bike around the mud, but that did not occur often. Yeah, I know that there are others that enjoy riding through the mud, but not me. Although I still did get plenty muddy by the end of the ride.


Then, I ran into this obstruction. The Park Rangers had blocked off the trail at this point. There used to be a bridge ahead that was washed out. I had to lift my bike over the downed trees and then walk my bike around where the bridge used to be. However it was pretty easy and I was on my way soon.






After about 6 or 7 miles, I reached this point, where you have to stop and lock your bike up. Bikes are not allowed any farther up the trail. The blue bike nearest the camera is my old Mountain Bike. From this point, I continued on foot up the trail. In the background, you can see 5 bikes locked up. Neither I nor the hiker ever saw the owners of these bikes.



As an aside, I took my old bike so that I would not have to take a second pair of shoes for the hike. My new Mountain Bike needs special bike shoes that are hard to walk in. Also, my new bike is fairly expensive and I do not like to leave it unattended, even if it is locked. Finally, this ride is relatively gentle, so the old bike did just fine.


After about 3/4 of a mile, I came across Berry Falls. This picture is rather dark and does not do justice to these falls. It was very pretty. I spent about 20 minutes, just sitting and enjoying the falls. Another nice feature of this trip is the redwood trees. The falls in the middle of a redwood forest is especially spectacular. Very nice!




Years ago, I had hiked around this area and recalled that there were a second set of falls further up the trail. I was not completely sure that this was the right trail, but decided to continue on anyway. My dim recollection was that the second falls were bigger and more dramatic than the first. After about 10 minutes, I was beginning to wonder if I was on the right trail. After another 10 minutes I stopped to reconsider. I almost turned around, but than decided to go a little farther. Just around the corner was this sight:

This is Silver Falls. I was a little disappointed, because these falls were smaller and less dramatic than the previous falls. The disappointment disappeared pretty quickly. It was so nice to just be out in the wilderness and to come across any waterfalls. After I reached this point, I turned around and headed back towards Highway 1. When I got home, I looked up a map on the internet and found that there was another set of waterfalls (Golden Cascade) just past Silver Falls. If I had just gone a little farther I would have seen these! Oh well, an excuse for another trip to this beautiful park.


As the name suggests, this trail runs from Skyline Boulevard at the top of the Santa Cruz Mountains down to the Sea by Waddell Creek Beach. I am familiar with the portion that runs through Big Basin State Park. The waterfalls are about half way down the 11 mile trail. A number of years ago, I hiked the top half of the trail. The hike starts at the top and it has a significant drop down to the waterfalls. It was quite challenging on the return trip, back up the hill to the start. It was very hot that day. Furthermore, I was not in the best shape and I did not bring enough water. I barely made it back to my car.

The bottom half (which I rode and hiked today) is relatively flat and much less demanding. It has a slight rise, but not much. It is a 6 to 7 mile ride to the bike racks. Then a 1.5 mile hike to both waterfalls. So in total, I rode about 13 miles and hiked about 3 miles. I especially wanted to make the ride this year, since we have had so much rain. I figured that the waterfalls would be pretty full. I was not disappointed.