Hiking Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve
Now if that isn’t a mouthful, I don’t know what is.
The final hike while in California was the Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve. After exploring the Marin Headlands the day before, we wanted a change of scenery and decided to go south. The Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve is located on the western slopes of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Parts of the trail at Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve overlook Half Moon Bay.
At the Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve, I was excited to get a glimpse of the Redwood trees as I had never seen any in person. Now, coast redwoods are only found along the coast from Oregon to Monterey. The coast redwoods are the tallest trees in the world and can grow up to 360 feet tall. The oldest known age of a redwood is 2,200 years, but the average is 500 to 1,000 year old.
When we got to Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve, we decided to do the Purisima Creek Trail. There is no big “parking lot” at Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve, and we parked on the side of the road.
At Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve there are several trails including the North Ridge Trail, Craig Britton Trail, Whittemore Gulch Trail, Harkins Ridge Trail, and Redwood Trail.
The Purisima Creek Trail was once an old logging road. It can get steep, and some of the grade was about 15%. The views at Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve are worth it, and it was one of my favorite hikes of the trip. We ended up hiking about 6 miles or so.
At first, I thought this was a banana pepper LOL.
The Redwood Trees, themselves at Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve, did not disappoint. They were huge!
So many gorgeous views at Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve
Hiking through California was a lot of fun. Even though the Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve hike was the shortest, my favorite was the Anderson County Park, but I enjoyed each of them. Each was different and unique.
Anderson Park was a surprising and beautiful dam. I’ve never hiked a Volcano until Calavera Hills. Marin Headlands had beautiful views on the entire route. The Los Robles Trail was fun to get out of traffic for a while and of course, seeing my first Redwoods at the Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve was wonderful too. I hope to be back to California again and check out some more different hikes.
You Can See All Hikes Here.
California Hikes from the Trip:
Hiking Marin Headlands (San Francisco)
Hiking Calavera Hills Community Park
Mini Trip to Los Angeles
Hiking Anderson Lake County Park
Los Robles Trail
Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve
Questions for you:
Have you ever seen Redwoods? Have you been to Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve?
What is a fun spot to hike near you?
It looks so beautiful there! It’s hard to even comprehend how giant those redwood trees are!
Before I went it was for me too. Now looking back, I’m like whoa that’s a big tree.