Hiking in San Francisco Bay Area

  There is no picture today.....
  I have been living this area more than 10 years.  I often go hiking in this area including trail running.  I also went hiking / climbing when I was in Japan.  A big difference between here in the US and Japan, I think people enjoy hiking more easy with very casual style.

   When I went hiking / climbing, I always carried a backpack with some food / snack and drink like water, some time many beers.  It was very rarely not to carry the back pack except very short walk.  However, there are many people just walk with a single bottle water on their hand on many trails.  Some people does not have anything, just walk and talking with friends.  I was a kind of surprised in the beginning.   But nowadays, I am one of them.

   Majority of trails in this area is not really mountain, I would say they are trails on hills.  Basically, the trails are not very long, most of them are just a few hours round trip and no very steep portion on trails.  Most of the time, if anything happening, it is very easy to going back to a car.  People does not have to worry about too much.  Weather in summer time or other than winter, it is very stable and it is very rarely raining in summer time.

   Many trails are short and probably a few hours walk is good enough.  Depending on how much time people have, people can choose many options to enjoy nice view on a hiking.  People can do hiking a sort of a daily life if people live in this area.  For visitors, I think it is a good option as a part of sight seeing.  It is different from a really nice view on a trail in a national park, but people can enjoy to see cites in the bay area and very easy access from cities.

  If people really look for a mountain that is something like in Japan, people probably need to go to Serra Nevada, Tahoe, Yosemite and etc.  There are many nice mountains in California.  But they are little far away from our town.... For typical weekend, just enjoying hills near our house  is very nice!  So that I really enjoy hiking nowadays!  Climbing mountain could be a few times a year nowadays.....