Check this out: Google Maps lists this as an alternate route to the Dowdy Ranch entrance to Henry Coe State Park:
Those roads are definitely on the map, but there’s no way to drive through them unless you own keys to the gates. Another reason to be at least a bit skeptical of online road-mapping software.
My Garmin GPS tried to route me that way for the Backcountry Weekend as well. Didn’t send me the ‘correct’ way until I started up 152 to Pacheco Pass.
Yeah, that’s an impossible route, even if you had gate keys….the park rangers would not allow private vehicles in the State Park under any circumstances (except for Back Country Weekend and maybe some other special occasion)….
This, incidentally, is why Henry Coe’s infamous “Short Cut” exists: for folks getting to their hunting and fishing cabins on the far side of Henry Coe, it’s faster to go via Dunne Avenue and Hobbs Road than this route up Mount Hamilton Road and down San Antonio Road.
Most of the firefighting equipment went up Hobbs Road for the same reason to fight that nasty fire that started near Booze Lake a couple years back.
Interestingly, it’s about the same distance, give or take a couple miles.
With a little bit of trespassing, that route’s more than feasible on a mountain bike.
Some of the sign posts along the Orestimba Creek Road give the distance north to Upper San Antonio Valley; the one I remember said 16.9 miles.
I was at Mississippi Lake for the weekend, and took a ride out to Jackrabbit and Paradise Lakes on Sunday (had the later to myself for the 45 minutes I was there).
I guess if you went that way you wouldn’t have to worry about getting caught up in outlet mall and amusment park traffic.