Henry Coe State Park
Rock House Ridge
Directions: From 101 at Morgan Hill, take the East Dunne Avenue exit going east. Eventually East Dunne will come to a fork at the Holiday Lake Estates. Take the right fork and follow it for about 10 miles into the hills and you will come to the park headquarters. The park is open 24/7.
Parking fee: $5.00
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On Saturday, 5-April-2008, I joined in with the Stanford Outing Club for a 20 mile hike in Henry Coe State Park looping around Rock House Ridge
The route: Henry Coe HQ -> Corral Trail -> Flat Frog Trail -> Frog Lake trail -Middle Ridge Trail ->
Hobbs Road -> Blue Ridge Road -> Black Oak Spring Trail -> Rock House Ridge Trail -> Narrows -> China Hole Trail -> Manzanita Point Road -> Springs Trail -> Corral Trail -> end
National Geographic TOPO! software website:
GPS Stats
Distance hiked: 20.0 miles
Total ascent: 4600 ft
Trailhead Elevation: 2662 ft
Max Elevation: 3216 ft
Moving time: 8 hrs 15 min
Moving Average: 2.4 mph
Overall average: 1.9 mph
Time stopped: 2 hrs
Personal stats
Dates Hiked:
5-Apr-2008
Start time: 9:45 AM
Weather: Temperatures in the 60’s for the hike, cool, clear and sunny with a light breeze. Simply beautiful!
Water consumed: 3 liters
plus 600 ml Gatorade
Finish time: ~ 8:00 PM
Total time: ~ 10 hrs 15 min
Beauty: This was probably the prettiest I had ever seen at Henry Coe. The hills were lush green from the winter rains with wildflowers in bloom.
Wildlife seen: 2 deer, 2 wild turkeys, 1 snake, and a frog.
Difficulty: This hike was strenuous for the distance and also the climb up the Hobbs Road “Short Cut” to Mount Sizer which climbs about 1500 ft in 1.25 miles for an average 22% grade. The Narrows had tricky footing through rocky ground in spots with no clear trail.
Sometimes I wonder if I am getting to old for this. As I sit here I am so sore I can barely walk, the result of a 20 mile, 4600 ft elevation gain hike with the Stanford Outing Club, led by who else but “V” and I have to say, “V” plans and leads great hikes.
His hikes vary in effort required but are generally all day affairs and tend to offer great views while challenging my ability to do them. On my own, I would probably be too timid to try such a hike as this. Having done it though, now I sit here with a sense of satisfaction in spite of all the sore muscles and pain.
This hike started easy enough though taking the Corral Trail from the park headquarters to the Flat Frog Trail and then to Frog Lake. That’s an easy and level enough hike that we did that at a very fast pace, probably close to 4 mph.
By the time we hit the climb up the Frog Lake Trail to the Middle Ridge Trail, we (and especially me) slowed down. But we made the 5.6 miles from Coe HQ to the bottom of the Short Cut on Hobbs Road in just under 2 hours for about a 2.8 mph pace. Not bad for me but everyone else was still waiting for me at every junction. I guess that is the hazard of hiking with young college students full of boundless energy as compared to me with my aging desk-bound bag of bones.
And from there we tackled the Short Cut, which I think is widely regarded as the steepest, meanest beast of a trail up a hill in the greater Bay Area and this was my third time up it.
I didn’t time my first time up last year. My second time up on a warm 80F day last June took me 1 hour 45 minutes. This time, given a cool day I made it up in 1 hour 15 minutes. I just put my head down and tried to keep moving slow taking as few breaks as possible. I just tried to keep moving and I shaved a half hour off my previous time. Even still, I was the last one up. The younger Stanford students were up 20-30 minutes before me and were waiting for me at the top and cheered when I finally got there.
After a quick break we hoofed it over to Mount Sizer where we enjoyed a short lunch break. One fellow had sushi up there and I couldn’t help but think that’s the way to do it!
From there we hoofed it down Blue Ridge Road to the Black Oak Spring Trail. This trail started out great with some recent trail work performed by those mighty souls that do this work. But soon this little traveled trail disappeared into the mountainside and “V” along with some other intrepid hikers spent time looking for remnants of it as we made our way down the hill. And then when we got to the bottom, there was no obvious trail going up the hill to the top of Rock House Ridge, so we ended up hiking straight up the hill along a small dry creek bed flowing down from the top.
We found the Rock House Ridge Trail at the top though and the view north from it into the areas burned by the September 2007 Lick fire was incredible. We found ourselves hiking through many burned areas and it was nice to see it starting to bounce back with new growth from the rains. In fact I found the hike down Rock House Ridge to be very beautiful with fresh leaves on the trees and wide-open meadows blooming with wild flowers in the green grass. In all my hiking at Henry Coe, I never imagined it could be so pretty.
Eventually we worked our way down to the Narrows in a section I had never been to and again I was surprised at the beauty there. The trail wondering along the East Fork Coyote Creek had the prettiest yellow wild flowers along it in lush green grass and with some of the neatest old rock formations. It was all just beautiful.
We finally made our way through the Narrows arriving at China Hole around 5:40 PM. We took a quick break there and had a snack before hitting the China Hole Trail for the climb back to Coe headquarters. By the time I got to the top I was so tired and my feet hurt so much that I pretty much just limped back the rest of the way finishing at about 8PM.
For me it was a tough hike and only my 6th hike of 2008, having been sidelined for nearly 2 months by the flu, chronic bronchitis, and asthma. I did a lot better than I expected though and now I have no excuse not to get out for more in this coming year. Now lets have a look see at the pictures.
