{"id":137,"date":"2005-11-20T23:01:38","date_gmt":"2005-11-21T04:01:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/?p=137"},"modified":"2008-04-19T10:11:08","modified_gmt":"2008-04-19T18:11:08","slug":"back-in-the-hills-of-henry-coe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/2005\/11\/20\/back-in-the-hills-of-henry-coe\/","title":{"rendered":"Back in the hills of Henry Coe"},"content":{"rendered":"

Weather last week was wonderful, except when it was gorgeous. I checked the San Jose forecast around Tuesday — blue skies and highs in the 70s through the weekend triggered my inner Boy Scout, which made it impossible to think of anything but a camp-out.<\/p>\n

There is an easy way to camp out, which is to drive the car to a campground, pitch your tent, build a fire, toast some marshmallows, pop open a beer, soak up the sound of birds in the trees and critters in the forest, retire to the tent with its cot and pillows from home, and fall asleep serenaded by the sounds of the night. <\/p>\n

The hard way is to cram as much as you can stand to carry into a backpack, hike seven miles through dry creeks and canyons to your campsite, pitch your tiny pup tent, twist and turn all night trying to get comfortable sleeping on the ground, serenaded by the sounds of mammalian creatures trying to get into your food supplies. <\/p>\n

As Mother Nature’s hostage, I chose the latter. <\/p>\n

Saturday morning, I drove as far as the headquarters of Henry Coe State Park<\/a>, which has some of the most brutal hill hikes in the region but also has some of the most scenic, uh, scenery. From there it was about seven miles or so to a remote notch in a hillside called Hidden Spring. <\/p>\n

The months since early June 2005 have mostly been a matter of resting up from my last Henry Coe camp-out in preparation for my next one. The park is simply spectacular in early spring, when the hills are green, the creeks are flowing and the wildflowers are in bloom. I figured, yeah, well, sure it’ll all be brown and blah but dammit, it’s the third weekend in November and it’s not raining, so I’m hitting those trails one last time before the winter rains hit. <\/p>\n

I was pleasantly surprised to find an abundance of fall colors, and the usual vistas of rugged hills and ridges. Henry Coe is all ridges — up them and down them till to reach your campsite or pass out trying. <\/p>\n

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About 2.5 miles from the park headquarters, I hiked down a steep hillside on the Soda Springs trail. The springs used to be a tourist destination many decades ago; there’s nothing down there now but a creek, a broken-up old shack and some kind of stone shelter. <\/p>\n

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Here’s the stone shelter. From here the trail zigzags across a creek for a mile and comes out at China Hole, the prettiest spot in this section of the park. Don’t try this route in the spring when the creek’s full of water, unless you have an incurable urge to to hike with cold, wet feet for a mile. <\/p>\n

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One of the puddles at China Hole. This was all under water last spring when I was here. <\/p>\n

The China Hole Trail continues up the ridge to the right near here. It’s about two miles to my campsite from here. It’s pretty much all uphill, but only about 600 feet of elevation gain. A cakewalk by Henry Coe standards. <\/p>\n

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Caught the afternoon sun shining through some leaves. <\/p>\n

Found the turnoff to Lost Springs Trail, hiked down about six-tenths of a mile, found my campsite — the privy even had toilet paper! <\/p>\n

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So I’ve got all my stuff set up by 1 p.m. Nothing to do but kick back and soak up the sights and sounds. <\/p>\n

Oh, wait, where’s that Lost Spring? <\/p>\n

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Ah, found it. It’s about a four-minute walk further down the trail. It looked perfectly clean and drinkable but I was a good Boy Scout and used my water filter. <\/p>\n

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I took a little afternoon hike, capturing this image of the setting sun illuminating a tree. <\/p>\n

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One leaf hasn’t gotten the "it’s time to turn brown" memo. <\/p>\n

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The required dead-tree picture. I saw so many examples of interesting live trees that I didn’t trouble myself with shooting many dead ones this time. <\/p>\n

Those are the Day One pictorial highlights. A few other observations: <\/p>\n