November 2019: Bay Area Ridge Trail: Redwood Valley Railway to Sibley Park

Hi, this is Chris Logsdon, Randi's husband. Sadly for us all, Randi passed away in October of 2019.
I thought I might try to continue her travel journey.

Randi and her brother began their journey on this ridge trail and had made it as far as the Redwood Valley Railway in Tilden Park.  On our last hike there in February 2018, we ended our hike with a very fun relaxing ride on a fully steam but miniature steam train.  It was a good capper on the end of a nice hike through the Tilden Regional Park in Wildcat Canyon.

Just yesterday, her brother Irving and I went back to the Railway parking lot to continue our hike along the ridge trail.  First I decided to take snapshots of our route from Google maps on my phone.  There are PDFs online but they are only good for an overview in my opinion.  We also decided we would be close enough to town to Lyft our way back to my car which we parked before hiking down.

 

 

From the maps and bay area ridge trail site, we could see we had to traverse EBMUD land, so Irving bought a year permit that was good for a year. ($10)    So we began a reasonably steep descent into the canyon.  There are some spectacular views from the trail:

We assumed this peak is Mt Diablo:

 

At about the 2 mile mark we crossed the Caldecott tunnel for Highway 24.  So I thought I would include this sign explaining the importance of the wildlife corridor that allows animals to move from one side to the other of this very busy road:

 

After the Old Tunnel staging area, the trail started to climb, so it was good that the beginning our hike was mostly downhill.  This is good hike but not impossible for even once in a while hikers like myself.

Getting  a Lyft proved to be a minor challenge.  I had to walk down the main road (Grizzly Peak Blvd) a ways to get a good signal.

On the way back home, we stopped for a well earned burger and fries (understatement) at one of our faves, Red Onion Burger in Pinole.  Big and tasty!  We both loved the Garlic Spinach Onion cheese burger (although I got bleu cheese on mine 👅)  and their garlic fries are the bomb with many good size dice of sweet garlic.  What a treat!   And boy was I tired.

Highly recommend this hike if you have 3-4 hours to leisurely enjoy it.  Although we did encounter runners and bikers and evidence of horse back riders, so in that case you only need about an hour. 😄