I wrote about Santa Clara County’s Healthy Trails Challenge awhile back, before it was possible to register for the challenge — which asks county residents to take five hikes in the next year, log the experience, mail in the log and receive some kind of swell gifts for completion (my guess is it will not be tequila shooters; sorry).
Well, now it’s possible to register online. This link has PDFs of the Healthy Trails brochure and and trail long. If you click on “Register” and fill out the forms, the county will mail a log to you.
Would’ve been nice if the county had added an online component to it, so folks could compare their results against other hikers in the area. Well, there’s always next year.
Though five hikes in 12 months didn’t strike me as an ambitious challenge, the county has put some challenging hikes on the list, including Grizzly Gulch Trail in Upper Stevens Creek Park and the hike up to Skyline Boulevard from Sanborn-Skyline County Park.
I feel an absurd urge coming on to hike all the trails in the challenge, just to set a good example, though setting good examples has never been a strong point of mine.
Tom, I signed up though I’m a regular hiker. Some of the easy ones they list are quite long but flat..I don’t think it should be listed as easy hikes if they are over 5 miles..like the Anderson’s Coyote Creek trail is 14 miles!! Yikes! Los Gatos Creek Trail 11.4 miles!!
They should also have a prize for the most mileage over a yr.
Chitactac-Adams Park is the Easiest ever. Only .25 miles! Too funny. Have u ever been? It’s the tiniest park ever and takes about 15 min to see everything.
Got my 1st prize..it’s a black banana w/ the Healthy Trail logo/design. The brochure and registration is included too..u can see brochure & reg online.
oops, sorry it was black bandana NOT banana..just a typo.
I wanted to mention we did a long hike at Mt. Madonna then went to Chitactac-Adams Park in one day. So u can do 2 in 1.
Ann: Any typo that’s funnier than the correct spelling is OK by me. I was hoping they really did send you a black banana w/the Health Trails logo on it.
It’s a nice program, and hopefully everyone can find a way to use it to challenge themselves. For some the 5 trails in a year is a challenge – for others, that’s a weekend outing. I’m going to challenge myself to hike the 12 trails on the list that I have not already done – and once that is complete maybe I’ll try to find every geocache along each of those trails.
This is good timing. I tend to hike in the Bay Area parks much more in the fall/winter than in the summer, usually on weekends where snowstorms keep me from wanting to drive in the Sierra.
Awesome tip! I just registered and am looking forward to my black banana, but even if you don’t fancy registering the PDF is still a great resource of trail routes.