East Bay Trails. David Weintraub
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at nearby Ardenwood Regional Preserve, and whose name is on the park entrance road, held the land until 1968.
The original occupants of the Coyote Hills area were the Ohlone Indians, whose village sites can be visited on naturalist-led tours. The sites, raised areas that were created by the debris of everyday life, are called “shell mounds,” or “kitchen middens,” because they contain mostly shells, animal bones, and ashes. But archaeological excavations of village sites have also uncovered jewelry, pieces of mortars and pestles, and remnants of hearths and house floors, along with human remains. Native people lived in willow-framed huts thatched with tule, and navigated the Bay’s waterways in kayak-like crafts made of bundled tules. Park naturalists and volunteers have built replicas of Indian buildings at the shell-mound site, and in 1979 they constructed a tule boat, which they paddled across San Francisco Bay. The Spanish referred to all Indians west of the Diablo Range from the Bay Area to Big Sur as Costanoans, or coast people, but today’s East Bay descendants prefer the term Ohlone.
Park gates open: 8 A.M. to 8 P.M., April–October; 8 A.M. to 6 P.M. November–March
Visitor center: (510) 795-9385; open 9:30 A.M. to 5 P.M.; closed Mondays, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.
LIZARD ROCK
Length: 0.8 mile
Time: 1 hour or less
Rating: Easy
Regulations: EBRPD; fees for parking and dogs; the single-track Lizard Rock Trail is for hiking only.
Facilities: Visitor center, picnic tables, water, toilet.
Directions: From Highway 84 at the east end of the Dumbarton Bridge in Fremont, take the Thornton Ave./Paseo Padre Pkwy. exit, and go north 1.1 miles on Paseo Padre Pkwy. to Patterson Ranch Road. Turn left, and go 0.5 mile to the entrance kiosk. Another 1.0 mile brings you to the parking area for the visitor center. The trailhead is at the west end of parking area, at its entrance.
Short and easy, this loop uses the Bayview, Lizard Rock, and Chochenyo trails to give you a quick sample of what this park has to offer, including an overview of the Main Marsh. If you have more time to spend here, consider also doing the “Red Hill” trip.
From the west end of the parking area, where the entrance road makes a 180-degree bend, head northwest on the paved Bayview Trail, passing the Quail Trail, a dirt road, left. The Bayview Trail is gated just beyond the parking area. After passing the gate, you have the Main Marsh on your right and beautiful grassy hills rising on your left. The Main Marsh, a brackish body of water bordered in places with cattails and bulrushes, is a haven for birds. There are several vantage points along the Bayview Trail to look for herons, egrets, ducks, and shorebirds. Black-necked stilts, which nest in marshes around San Francisco Bay, are sometimes here in flocks of 20 to 30—look for a black-and-white shorebird with shocking pink legs. Besides a few willows and London planetrees (introduced hybrids related to sycamores), the vegetation is mostly scrub—coyote brush, fennel, and poison hemlock.
When you reach a junction with the Nike Trail, about 0.1 mile from the trailhead, continue straight on the Bayview Trail. Across the Main Marsh is Lizard Rock, a large pinnacle of light-colored chert, reached by the single-track trail that bears its name. Chert was used by local Native Americans for arrowheads and spear points when they could not obtain obsidian. After about 0.25 mile you reach a junction with the Lizard Rock Trail, where you turn right and climb on a gentle grade to the rock, passing it on the left. This is a wonderful vantage point from which to look out over the marsh.
You might also take a moment here to scan the eastern skyline, picking out such landmarks as Mission Peak and, to its right and beyond, Mt. Hamilton. Once past Lizard Rock, the trail descends gently across an open hillside of grass mixed with clumps of California sagebrush. After an unsigned single track joins from the left, you reach a T-junction with the Chochenyo Trail. Turn right and follow the dirt-and-gravel road back toward the visitor center, passing deeper water where white pelicans sometimes float lazily about. The marsh wren, a chickadee-sized bird mostly heard but not seen, is likely to keep track of your progress with its raspy, buzzing call.
Hikers approaching Lizard Rock, which overlooks the Main Marsh.
Here is a good opportunity to learn the difference between cattails and bulrushes, both of which are found along this stretch of the route. Cattail (genus Typha) is a familiar perennial marsh plant, found where there is at least some fresh water, best identified by its brown, cigar-like flower clusters held aloft on tall stems. Bulrush, also called tule, refers to plants of the genus Scirpus, which has 9 species in coastal California and 17 throughout the state. The ones found here have tall, round stems tapering to a sharp point, and tipped during late spring and summer with brown flower clusters. Red-winged blackbirds share the cattails and bulrushes with the marsh wrens. Blackbirds are vocal wizards, keeping up a constant refrain of odd gurgles, chortles, whistles, and other sounds.
A gate marks the south end of the Chochenyo Trail. Beyond the gate, you come to a T-junction with a paved path that parallels the park entrance road. To the left is a short paved path leading to a boardwalk that goes into the marsh, a route followed by the self-guiding Muskrat Trail. To return to the parking area, turn right and follow the paved path.
RED HILL
Length: 1.5 miles
Time: 1 hour or less
Rating: Moderate
Regulations: EBRPD; fees for parking and dogs; the Quail Trail is for hiking only.
Facilities: Visitor center, picnic tables, water, toilet.
Directions: From Highway 84 at the east end of the Dumbarton Bridge in Fremont, take the Thornton Ave./Paseo Padre Pkwy. exit, and go north 1.1 miles on Paseo Padre Pkwy. to Patterson Ranch Road. Turn left, and go 0.5 mile to the entrance kiosk. Another 1.0 mile brings you to the parking area for the visitor center. The trailhead is at the west end of parking area, at its entrance.
Combining portions of the Bayview, Nike, Red Hill, Soaproot, and Quail trails, this short loop over the summits of Red and Glider hills offers more scenery per calorie expended than any other hike in the East Bay. Besides open summits, which provide 360-degree views that extend from San Francisco to the Santa Cruz Mountains, this park contains an extensive brackish marsh, habitat for waterfowl and shorebirds. If you have more time to spend here, consider also doing the “Lizard Rock” trip.
From the west end of the parking area, where the entrance road makes a 180-degree bend, head northwest on the paved Bayview Trail, passing the Quail Trail, a dirt road, left. The Bayview Trail is gated just beyond the parking area. After passing the gate, you have the Main Marsh on your right and beautiful grassy hills rising on your left.
When you reach the Nike Trail, about 0.1 mile from the trailhead, you climb left, leaving the Bayview Trail to its straight and level course. (The Nike Trail is named for the missiles perched atop these hills during the cold war, not the running shoe.) As you gain elevation on a moderate grade, take a moment to look back and admire the view, which takes in Mt. Diablo, the hills of Garin and Dry Creek Pioneer regional parks, Sunol Ridge, Mission Peak, and Mt. Hamilton. In late spring, the grasses of the Coyote Hills turn a rich, golden brown, especially pleasing an hour or two before sunset; after the autumn rains arrive they become lush green.
Soon you reach a flat spot—a saddle between Red Hill and an unnamed hill to the north—and a four-way junction. The view from here stretches across San Francisco Bay, with its system of levees and salt ponds, to the hills of San Mateo County. Turning left here onto the Red Hill Trail, a dirt road, you continue your ascent over open terrain, with views of the marshes that compose much of this regional park. To the northeast lies Alameda Creek, which gets its start high on the flanks of Mt. Hamilton, flows through the Sunol Wilderness, and empties into San Francisco Bay northwest of here. The Alameda County flood-control channel, which diverts water from the creek, borders the north side of Coyote