mt tamalpais

This weekend I went hiking at Mount Tamalpais with a few new friends. Our plan was to hike from near Stinson Beach to the eastern peak of Mount Tamalpais, then drive to the Tamales Bay Oyster farm to enjoy some seafood.

We started out on the Dispea Trail, which starts near Stinson Beach. It takes you through a deep forest with spooky looking trees. But it soon rises out onto a small hill with an amazing view of the beach.

I’d like to think that she’s smiling back at me…

But she’s probably smiling at the view behind me… Seriously, it’s a nice view of Stinson Beach from here.

From there we took the Steep Ravine trail, which again is in a deep forest.

The Steep Ravine trail is pretty true to its name. It winds through a deep ravine and gains a lot of elevation very rapidly, with lots of switchbacks, lots of steps, and even a ladder.

At the top of the Steep Ravine trail was a ranger station and parking lot. There were a ton of bicyclists gathered here, for what I assume was a club ride.

From there we continued up towards the peaks of Mount Tamalpais.

As we gained elevation we started to see the tops of the buildings in downtown San Francisco peaking over the hills.

There’s a pretty good view of Sutro Tower, but unfortunately it was sort of hazy that day.

We got to the West Point Inn, a few miles short of the eastern peak. We decided to turn back here to make sure we would make it to the oyster farm before closing.

We made it to the oyster farm less than half an hour before closing. We ended up buying 50 oysters and a few pounds of clams. Since the farm was closing, and since it would be getting dark soon anyways, we decided to drive back to Davis with them. Luckily we had a cooler and a ton of ice to keep our seafood fresh. It was a pretty awesome meal, and a great way to cap off a beautiful day of hiking.