Hybrid ride 7/19: Wildcat-Tilden

It was hot and humid, so John and I didn't leave the house for this ride until about 5 pm.  We took our mountain bikes, but headed out on the road.  We followed the Ohlone Greenway multiuser trail to Key and McDonald in Richmond and then city streets over to Wildcat Canyon Regional Park, about 5 miles.  There was some steep climbing at the end before entering the park. 

Once in the park, we continued on the main trail, Wildcat Creek Trail (the one that used to be a road, but has been "abandoned" for many years and is returning to nature) for a short distance to the start of the Havey Canyon trail.  Havey Canyon is a narrow trail that mostly climbs through trees and shrubs.  There are a couple of gates to go through and one stream to cross.  The entrance and exit to the steam are very steep without much room to maneuver, so we walked it.

Entrance to Havey Canyon Trail.

John closing one of the gates after we went through.

At the top of the trail, it connects to the paved Nimitz Way trail.  We took Nimitz across park boundaries into Tilden Park. Along the way we saw, cows, rabbits and various birds.  Nimitz is the trail that begins at Inspiration Point.  We exited the trail at Inspiration Point and took a right on to Wildcat Drive.  We rode a very short distance to Seaview Trail on the opposite side of the road.

View from Nimitz Way.

Seaview starts by climbing up to a ridge.  (The trail seems to change names to East Bay Skyline Regional Trail and then again to Bay Bay Ridge Trail.)  There were some good views from the ridge.  We also got a very small amount of rain.  After a while, it was starting to get dark, so we decided we better hurry up and head home.  We took Upper Big Springs Trail downhill to South Park Drive. 

View from Seaview Trail.

We got on the road and went a short way down to the intersection with Wildcat Drive.  We pulled off to the side of the road and put lights on the bikes.  We continued on Wildcat toward Grizzly Peak Blvd, then headed down Spruce and through Kensington to get home via paved roads.

Stats:
19.7 miles
1,748 feet elevation gain

Park maps:
Tilden: http://www.ebparks.org/Assets/_Nav_Categories/Parks/Maps/Tilden+map.pdf
Wildcat: http://www.ebparks.org/Assets/_Nav_Categories/Parks/Maps/Wildcat+map.pdf.pdf