Mountain Network News, a local monthly newspaper serving Los Gatos and the Santa Cruz Mountains, has an excellent page of hikes throughout the Bay Area.

The site’s keeper is one Neil Wiley, who gets extra credit for a) owning a vintage Jaguar E Type and b) writing editorials chastising the local school board.

Hike descriptions generally start with an introduction to the site’s history. I was fond of this one, from a stroll at Bear Creek Open Space Preserve:

James L. Flood’s father was reputed to be the wealthiest man in California. He paid his son’s girlfriend, a beautiful blond, blue-eyed burlesque queen, $25,000 to leave town. She did, but his son followed, and the couple married in Naples. Although she was never accepted by the family, father and son reconciled. Lucky for the son. He and his sister divided an estate valued at $18.5 million.

I think if you’ve got enough money to pay your progeny’s ill-considered paramours to leave town, you should, because it makes such a great story when your diabolical schemes go terribly wrong.