We had a lovely and easy hike loop (it's just over 6 miles with much of it level) from Pantoll (pantoll-old mine-cataract-willow camp-coastal-matt davis-pantoll) and going along Cataract on the backside and then circling around on Coastal on the front side where you can see the Pacific on a clear day. Cataract still had a trickle of water which was amazing for July in itself that part of the trail was largely in shade and it was early enough to be cool. Around Willow Camp we got full sun and soon onto Coastal the fog started to win and there was lovely rain under some of the trees. The landscape in general was pretty dry. The photos below kind of follow the path we took of fog in the distance, sun sun sun and then fog in the trees and damp wind and back to sun.
Fog mountainfog mountain coming to the sunny slopes of Mt. Tamlooking up a ravine from coastal trailit's a bird, it's a plane no it's a bird....Several plants of what we think are the rare Tiburon Buckwheat along Coastal trailAnother plant of what we think is Tiburon Buckwheatwindy spooky warm cool trailCalifornia bay and the skinny Coastal trail. Time to practice the limbo dance.we all should spend a little more time looking up at the sky from where we aretraditional resting spot for lunch: on a sunny day it has a miraculous view ; on a foggy day an equally good show is on
Speaking of lunch...we've discovered what might be the best hiking lunch ever. We've modified this recipe by David Tanis on for Tomato Salad on a roll and make it hike proof by putting it on Acme's whole grain (70%WW and 30%rye) "edible schoolyard" dinner rolls. The whole wheat sourdough is soggy but not all the way through after 3 to 4 hours of hiking. I can only imagine what would happen to white bread. At any rate, the anchovy garlic heirloom tomato mess is to die for on the trail. Never have I had it so good.
time to learn about geology! What is that mysterious green rock near Pantoll?What we saw on this hike includes but is not limited to:
Many Western Fence Lizards
Red Tailed Hawk
Crows
Ravens
Varied Thrush
Dragon Flies (unidentified and abundant)
Barn Swallow
Western Skink with BLUE tail (yes our first and we were so amazed by the blue tail that we couldn't move much less take a picture)
What we saw on this hike includes but is not limited to: