Skyline Boulevard in the Santa Cruz Mountains is the Great White (well, green) Way for South Bay folks who like to get out of the house on a sunny Sunday. Hikers, bikers, Harley riders, runners and crotch-rocketeers all find something to keep themselves occupied up this way. Today we saw a club made up entirely of Vespa-type scooters dashing down the road as fast as their tiny motors would propel them. A minute later a guy on a bike obviously stolen from a nearby raceway roared past us at north of 90 mph.

Having neither helmet nor wheeled device, I was obliged to walk. Which is the best way to explore this part of the world anyway. This time I found myself hiking in the Long Ridge Open Space Preserve again, accompanied by FOMFOK leaders Mike and Kathy and fellow regulars Donna, Peggy and Joanne. The idea was to toddle down to the Peters Creek Loop, an easy patch of trail that goes by a pond occupied by underwater creatures and the waterfowl who eat them.

We never got anywhere near the pond, or Peters Creek for that matter, but we did get in one of those hikes that secures Long Ridge’s position as a gateway to untold hiking opportunities throughout the hills nearby. There’s about a dozen open space districts in the area plus a couple state and county parks in case you get bored on the other ones. In a course of about five miles we crossed the borders of Castle Rock State Park, Saratoga Gap Open Space Preserve and Upper Stevens Creek County Park, which works out to four parks in less than three hours. (A local hiking club has an annual outing passing through most of these jurisdictions; it’s over 25 miles.)

Enough gabbing, let’s see some pictures.

Mike scouts a route shortly after we abandoned our plan to hike to Peters Creek. We ended up on the Achistaca Trail, a pretty single-track (no dogs, no bikes) that heads south for a little under 2 miles and connects with the Skyline to the Sea Trail, which goes through Castle Rock and Big Basin state parks and continues west till you run out of continent or become incontinent, whichever comes first.

The trail’s mostly shaded but the open areas offer excellent vistas looking out toward the Pacific Ocean.

Sometimes I point my camera straight up and click, hoping for the best.

Donna points out the Skyline to the Sea Trail on the Castle Rock State Park map as we near Saratoga Gap at the intersection of Highways 9 and 35. (Just about any location with “Gap” in it sounds adventurous, don’t you think? Must be because when we hear “gap” we imagine somebody leaping across it, though if we have imaginations blackened by 20 years in the news biz we secretly hope for a mishap yielding a spectacular crash that necessitates the usage of large black type on the front page.)

Some kind of relay race requiring people to jog from sea level to the Saratoga Gap (over 2,000 feet up) was afoot on Sunday. That crowd in the distance is presumably those who made it up before the batteries on the defibrillator expired.

Rental trucks carrying the runners’ support staff were whimsically decorated. Fortunately, no DEA or Mexican drug cartel officials were nearby to offer their assistance.

Saratoga Gap trail heads north from the Gap, parallel to Skyline most of the way. It’s mostly covered but did have this pretty green open area near the beginning. It’s open to mountain bikers and hikers, which obliges both to remain in full-politeness mode. Everybody we saw was super nice.

There’s nothing more pathetic than a Bug on its back, eh? Lord knows how long it’s been here.

Another point-and-hope shot.

Had to have at least an attempt at a dead-tree pic, though the forest along here is really healthy, so the snags are rare.