Castle Rock State Park

The past two weekends here in the bay area have been absolutely amazing! Both weekends Brett and I headed out into nature for two completely different hikes - one by the beach and then this one with the pictures above at Castle Rock State Park.

Castle Rock runs through the Santa Cruz Mountains and has a combination of rock formations, beautiful scenery and dense forest. The trails are a little more experienced because one minute you are walking on a large cleared out trail, the next minute the trail disappears and you are climbing over rocks to get back to the trail. You also get to go through some dense forest and completely lose all sounds of civilization until you get to a clearing with a ledge or a huge rock {see last picture} and realize just how high you have climbed along with some amazing views of the forest and even out to the coast. They also have camping grounds which you hike to and miles and miles of trails. We ended up hiking around for about 4 hours, Brett almost had to carry me back to the car because I was so tired at the end! :]

Unfortunately they are planning on closing down the park because of our Governor's current budget cuts to stop funding for the park rangers. I believe that there are a few groups and organizations working to keep the park open and funding for the park rangers to help maintain and watch over the area. Hopefully their efforts pay off and we can all enjoy this amazing park for a lot longer.

Whether you're a local or tourist & even a little "outdoorsy" I would highly recommend this entire area, also known as the Saratoga Gap Trail for anyone to come and take advantage of some of California's beautiful landscape.

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