Black Mountain Hiking !

Nice Blue sky!

I went hiking to Black Mountain while kids were in Japanese school today.

Black Mountain

Black Mountain is one of peaks on a hill located west side of Silicon valley.   On the hill, it is a wide ridge and a trail is going through from a winery Ridge to Page Mill Road.   The trail is not really steep and I used to run in this area for my training.  Due to an injury on my left foot, I was just walking for fun!

 There is a course guide and map in the parking lot

To reach the top of Black Mountain, one is from Rancho San Antonio and the other is either from Page Mill Road or Skyline Boulevard.   Today, I started from a parking lot on Skyline Blvd.
This parking is usually not busy and it is easy to find out a parking spot.   I think parking along Page Mill might be a little harder.   So I always park a parking along Skyline Blvd.  This area is Skyline ridge open space preserve.  There is an area map in the parking lot.

 Parking lot

From Skyline Blvd

First of all, from the parking lot, we need to across Skyline Blvd.  Then there is a gate to get into the trail.

 Trail entrance on Skyline Blvd

 From the parking lot, the trail is going down to Stevens Creek, the trail name is Skid Road Trail.  Due to rainy days last a several days, the trail was muddy and it was not easy to walk this morning.  The trail is getting into in a forest and there is a nice shade in summer time.  However, the trail was getting more muddy today.

There was nice shade!

The trail merges Stevens Creek Nature Trail and continue to go down to the creek.  In summer time, there is usually no water, but this time of the season, the water stream was still there and the sound of the water stream was really comfortable.  The birds were singing.  There is no other people except some mountain biker some time.  I really enjoy a quiet trail in the morning. 

Once we get out from the forest, there is no tree

The trail merges Canyon Trail and branch to Indian Creek Trail.  The trail is a fire track lane, but view is really nice.  The sky is blue and cloud in the sky is really beautiful.  It was getting warmer and started sweating.  But it is a part of training, so that I kept fast walking pace to the top of the hill.

 Top of the hill is wide open

It's almost the top of Black Mountain!

On the top of hill, it is flat and wide.  The view for the east side is nice.  We can see Silicon Vally.

View from the top of the hill

I saw San Francisco!!

On the way back, I took different trail.  Old Ranch Trail to Bella Vista Trail, then back to Canyon Trail.   This trail is really quiet, I only saw a trail runner other than deers.

Getting back to the shade near creek, the trail was getting dry and it was not too bad like early in the morning.

I think Spring is the best season, we can see many wild flowers including California Poppy.   I would recommend to try this!

 I do not know this flower name, but it is pretty

California Poppy

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