The last weekend of January arrived and instead of the forecasted rainy weather, we got a break before more rain on Monday and Tuesday.

So, I decided to do another new hike at Lake Chabot. It’s another close park to my new home and has a nice loop trail (but long at almost 12 miles).

Then I woke up Saturday and didn’t feel like hiking.

So I did a 20 mile bike ride instead. 🙂

Yeah, still a lot of exercise, but it took less time (so I could be a couch potato the rest of the day 🙂 ). I decided to do the Lamorinda Loop Trail again, but counter-clockwise this time. The first part was a section from Moraga to Lafayette that I often use for my morning bike rides. If I didn’t feel like doing the whole loop, I could always turn around along this part. Then I took the second ride along the part heading through and around downtown Lafayette.

When I crossed over the freeway to start riding along Deer Hill Road, I started to think I had chosen wisely two weeks ago when I decided to do this loop clockwise. In this direction, the bike ride was a pretty steep one (it had been a nice coasting descent the first time 🙂 ).

Then I had to also climb El Nido Rancho Road, which again was much tougher in this direction.

Fortunately, St Stephens Trail was a nice descent into Orinda. Then it was climbing again along Moraga Way, but this part wasn’t that steep so I made it to the high point soon enough. Then a nice final coasting descent into Moraga and home.

It’s a little long (2 and half hours) for a normal weekday bike ride, but it does work well as a long weekend bike ride.

I wasn’t sure I’d do it, but Sunday arrived and I headed for Anthony Chabot Regional Park. I decided to do the Lake Chabot Lake Loop, which overs a big chunk of this park. Coming from Moraga, the East side trailheads were the most logical places to start from.

Starting from a small staging area along Marciel Rd would be the most direct point to access the loop trail, but it was closed due to COVID-19. So I started from Marciel Gate along Redwood Rd.

It would mean an extra 3/4th of a mile to get to the actual loop trail, but wasn’t that bad in the grand scheme of things. I decided to go in a clockwise direction for no particular reason.

After a little while, I ended up at the small staging area I would have liked to have started from. One nice thing about this spot is that there was a short hike up a small hill that had a great view of the whole park. I could see a good part of the southern part of the San Francisco Bay as well as the City of San Francisco and Mt Tamalpais and Mt Diablo. A nice way to start the day and encourage me to continue down to Lake Chabot. Ironically, despite the grand view of the area you couldn’t see the actual lake from that vantage point (it was hidden behinds hills and forests).

While the descent was easy, I knew it also meant I’d have to re-climb the elevation I was descending (roughly going from 925 feet to around 250ft at the shore of the lake.

The dirt trail turned into a paved trail along the south side of the lake, which also meant there were more people around to socially distance myself from. There were also a lot of parking areas along the Southeast side of the lake, so that also contributed to the increase in people.

It was a nice hike around the lake with glimpses of the lake, the forest, and surrounding hills. The Marina area was pretty busy, but I have to imagine it was normally a lot busier on Sundays before COVID-19.

The West shore of the lake was a nice walk, with more views of the area.

After I crossed the Chabot Dam, the trail turned to dirt again and then started to climb. Unfortunately, it then descended back to the shoreline where I decided to take a lunch break.

Then it was a gentle climb up to where the trail hit Skyline Blvd. In retrospect, this may have been a better place to start from, but too late now.

Again, there was a small descent to where the trail crossed a stone bridge. Then I started the final climb back to my Jeep. I could have saved a little distance by going up Cottontail Trail, but for the same reason I didn’t use it to start my day (it was a pretty steep trail) I continued and completed the official Lake Charlot Lake Loop before climbing up another 3/4 mile to my Jeep.

So, 13 miles in 6 hours. A nice hike, if an exhausting one.