Henry Coe State Park
Last Friday, Nancy, Joaquin, Judy, Mike and I went to Henry Coe State Park to ride our horses and see the wild flowers. Henry Coe is a huge park, 81,000 acres according to the rangers, with very few access points and amenities. In addition, during summer and fall, it's hotter than blue blazes. As a result, there are very few people there and it's always a great adventure to go.
This trip was particularly rewarding because it was the height of wildflower season. I didn't get any pictures of the flowers specifically, but they were all over, in all colors and shades: blue, red, purple, violet, white, and yellow.
We parked at Hunting Hollow, took Gilroy Hot Springs Road (2 miles of asphalt with car traffic) to the start of Coit fireroad (no cars), where we actually entered the park. We went up Coit to Mahoney Meadows Road until we came to the singletrack for Los Cruzeros. We followed that until we started toward Willow Ridge and then we followed Willow Ridge Road back to Coit Road. Based on map reading and my mountain biking experiences in the park, I'd guess it to have been a 28 mile ride, with probably 7,000 feet of climbing.
If you want to see some other views of the park, AND you have a fast internet connection, check this link. You may have to download a quicktime viewer, but it allows you to take virtual reality tours of parts of the park. Okay, NOT VR, but panoramic pictures you get to drive around in.
The Ride Begins
This is our start. Mike and his horse, Mikey, led the way out of the park. To get through the entrance gate at the park, you have to step over three large logs while turning a half circle around the end of the gate (it's to keep bikers from riding through it). You can just see it in the second picture. It was quite a challenge to the less experienced horses; Mikey and Nadia both are just out of school and were pretty flummoxed by the whole idea. However, they both were eager learners. We stopped to adjust girths, etc. just a little while later and Nadia gave one last look toward the trailer before heading seriously up hill.
After we got through the gate, we had about 7 miles of fire road up a serious hill, but the views kept at least the human component of the expedition distracted: lots of live oak and meadows. As you can see, we were a pretty happy bunch. Joaquin was a particularly free spirit; he and Cara took the path less travelled at about every opportunity.
The fire road ended when we got to the ridge top and saw what has to be the outhouse with the best view in Central California - it's the little white building in the distance. When we got there, we headed down some seriously single singletrack.
After quite awhile on the single track, we emerged into a valley with a river running through it. It was very beautiful as it unfolded from behind Judy's shirt. All the horses took the opportunity to drink and Nancy's horse, Tonto, looked like he was contemplating rolling, too.
We followed the stream for quite a while, then broke off and started our long singletrack climb to the ridgetop. Half way up, we found a picturesque and almost flat place to give the horses a breather and grab a bite of lunch for ourselves. It wasn't too long before Nancy mounted up, though, and got us dogies rollin'.
We finally achieved the ridgetop and our Fearless Leader, Nancy, looked both pleased and proud - as well she should, it was a beautiful place to have led us to.
After that, it was mostly downhill to home - but a very long downhill. When we started, we thought the ride would be 20 miles or, as Joaquin said "This is how far the Boys used to ride for a beer, when they went into Virginia City from the Ponderosa." It actually turned out to be a little longer and I'm not sure we all had appreciated how much climbing there would be. Judy, Mike and I all hand walked out horses for significant amounts of the last 8 miles. But what a great place to take a walk with your horse!
We finally made it back to Hunting Hollow where we let the horse graze and roll before the long trip home.
