go hiking more often

We went on a short hike at Waddell Creek / Rancho del Oso last weekend. It was a beautiful day and it’s a gorgeous valley. We walked up the south side and did the nature trail—without the key to all the numberings. We also headed up the Skyline-to-the-Sea trail for a ways, until time limitations made us turn around. Someday we’ll do the whole trail, although I prefer to do it in the downhill direction.

Recently we took a extended walk around Harvey West park and we also explored DeLaveaga Park, it was quite fun. not true hikes, but fun outdoor urban excursions. Lots of Banana Slugs!

but it felt really big. There was a walk through the neighborhood to a park with a duck pond then a short hike to the beach to watch the waves and the birds. It was utterly amazing even though it wasn’t strenuous. I’m going to assume it’s the small steps that turn this into a habit and celebrate each one.

A great hike up above the town of Las Cruces, NM. This is the Dripping Springs State Park, and the hike is up into the mountains.

Its really not that far, and if you make it up all the way to Van Pattens Sanitarium, hike up behind the buildings to Van Pattens Reservoir and check out these sights.

We got ourselves out of bed this morning and drove down to Andrew Molera State Park in Big Sur. We did the short walk to the beach, played around there, went up to the Bluff Trail, then hit the Ridge Trail to the top of the first crest, then down Hidden Trail and back to the car. We didn’t plan any of it, just went where we felt like it. If we’d brought more water and worn the right clothes we might have gone all the way to the top crest.

It was beautiful, not too sunny and not too hot but the clouds kept letting in enough sunlight for gorgeous pictures. There’s a whole spiel about fresh air and I buy into it completely, I don’t buy into the bugs so much, and the road apples were annoying, but the sheer pleasure of taking in that amazing landscape is worth any climb.

We went on the shortest hike the other night. It was bassically an extended walk out to the ocean, but I count it because it was so beautiful and it reminded me how many wonderful things are out there if you just take the time and make the effort to see them.