Windy Hill Hike - Portola Valley, CA

On April 5, 2008, I hiked Windy Hill Open Space Preserve in Portola Valley off Hwy 35 Skyline Blvd.

It was ...Windy hence the name... about to rain and cold at 8am! The hike started off on all down hill on Hamms Gulch Trail for 3 miles into the beautiful green canyon of the preserve. The trail had a long series of switchbacks leading us to a beautiful stream pictured below.

My hiking group now called T2 (Trail Trekker's) is the medium fast group which has developed. Our mentor was Paula for the day. We strolled along Eagle Trail which meets up with Alpine Road for .6 miles at about 1000 ft elevation.

Here I am with my hiking buddies as we stopped to enjoy some lunch and search for some sun since we were still cold at the valley floor.

After lunch, we started up Razorback Ridge Trail which climbs 800 feet in 2.3 miles, then over to the lost trail for another 1.5 miles. The climb was steep and long. My group decided we would stop at the top which seemed to never come! I was very aware of my legs by this point in the hike being almost 4 hours into it. We took the entrance trail back over to Anniversary Trail and climbed up to see the spectacular views of Portola Valley to the East overlooking Stanford University and Hwy 35 to the west and the Pacific Ocean. It was an 8 mile hike that I will feel later. As you can see it was still windy, but turned out to be a gorgeous day.

As I drove home I realized just how amazing the area is around me and I am looking forward to next weekend when we will hike Big Basin with the Giant Redwood trees.

Hike On!