December 2021 Day Hikes & Bike Rides

After two weekends when I had very little energy or desire to go out and hike (although I did get some long bike rides in), I finally went to Mt Diablo and planned to climb at least up Mt Olympia. I did my best not to find a reason to not go. Got my hiking clothing on first thing after waking up, having breakfast, and heading out the door without thinking too much about it.

It might have also helped that a big storm was moving through the SF Bay Area starting Sunday, so this was the only day this weekend that I could do a hike. A little extra motivation instead of telling myself ‘Oh… I can just hike on Sunday’.

I started from Marsh Creek Road right around sunrise and headed up the Olympia Trail. Got some nice light from the sunrise, but if I was really gunning to see the sunrise I’d have had to start at least a hour earlier and started the hike in darkness with my headlamp.

I wasn’t motivated enough for that. 🙂

Going up the East side of Mt Olympia wasn’t an easy hike and was quite steep in places, but I’ve done it often enough that I pretty much know the best places to rest and the best places to try to forget so I don’t swear never to do this hike ever again. 🙂

Despite my recent lack of hiking, I made it to the top of Mt Olympia in about two and a half hours. There were several mountain bike riders near the top, which was usual since I don’t normally see them on this part of Mt Diablo State park. They seemed to be examining some areas off trail. I didn’t see them go down the East Ridge Trail while I was at the top.

Regardless, I enjoyed the view and had a brief rest. The plan was to go over to North Peak and then decided from there if I’d go over to the Main Summit. North Peak from Mt Olympia was only a little over a mile, but 700 feet to climb to reach that peak. Still after climbing almost 2,000 feet to get up Mt Olympia, it was worth it to make use of that hard work to do more hard work. Not sure why that makes sense to me, but it did. 🙂

Traversing over to the North Peak ridge was easy enough, but the final 100 or so feet up to the actual North Peak was very steep on a very crumbling road with pieces of old pavement and concrete still hanging onto the rock and dirt that made up the mountain. Probably my least favorite trail on Mt Diablo (the steep section of Old Prospectors Road is a close second, though).

Then it was the moment to decide what I’d do. It was 600 feet down, 900 feet back up, and 2 miles (one way) to reach the Main Summit. It would basically be the ‘Mt Diablo Three Summits’ hike. I could also retrace my steps and go back down to my Jeep via Mt Olympia.

The third option was to descend down a use trail on the east side of North Peak. That wasn’t an official trail, but used enough that it was clear and obvious where to go. I’ve been meaning on hiking it again someday (I’d done it twice before), so this would be a good chance to make a loop out of the day’s hike.

I decided to go for the Main Summit to get all three peaks in that day. Call it penance for being a couch potato for the past two weekends.

It was a straightforward hike that I’ve done dozens of times, so really no surprises or problems. Just took time.

As I started the final climb from Devil’s Elbow (half mile to hike and 400 feet to climb), a large roar pierced the relative quite of the mountain (relative since you always had car noise as you approached the summit). I saw a large group of motorcyclists roar by on the Summit Road heading for the summit. So much for any peace and quiet at the summit, but if you wanted silence and solitude, you didn’t come to Mt Diablo’s main summit. 🙂

Regardless, I made it to the top, saw the view from the top of the summit building, stepped onto the exact summit (which was inside the building that had been built around it), and bought a Diet Coke to enjoy (after hiking down a bit to get away from the motorcyclists crowding the upper summit parking lot).

To get back to my Jeep, I retraced my steps back and them up to where the trail traverses over to Mt Olympia. There I had to decide if I was going to go back the way I came or if I’d do the trail down the East side of North Peak. It was getting late in the day and with sunset around 5pm, it would likely be dark by the time I got back to my Jeep. I thought I’d be able to make it back to Morgan Territory Road at least before dark, and hike back about a mile along the road to my Jeep.

After thinking about it during a brief rest at the junction, I decided that trail was a bit too rough to be attempting that late in the day. I chose the safer option of going down Mt Olympia’s East Ridge the way I came up. It was steep and slow going, but it was a trail I knew very well and there would be no surprises.

As it was, I got back near my Jeep near sunset and actually got to see some of the light from the Sunset lighting up the clouds. I couldn’t see the actual Sun, but the light show was a nice end to the day.

So it became an accidental Sunrise to Sunset hike. 13 miles in 10 hours.

The following weekend, I headed to Black Diamond Mines. I started from the East side and made my way around to Prospect Tunnel. A longish tunnel that you can walk down into. Unfortunately, by that point I was feeling pretty bad and think I might have caught a bug. Instead of doing one of the loop hikes I could have done from that point, I retraced my steps back to my Jeep. A short hike, but at least I got any hiking in.

With a series of storms moving through the Bay Area, it was going to be a very wet Christmas. Fortunately, there was a brief window of clear weather on Christmas Eve and since I had the day off, I had to take advantage of the good weather when I could.

Due to all the rain we had already had, I decided to go to Wildcat Canyon and hike along the ridge. The Nimitz Trail there was paved, so I could avoid mud and slipping and sliding that I may face at other nearby trails.

It was a nice clear morning and the 4 miles to the end of the paved trail was enjoyable with great views of the entire Bay Area. After a short snack, I headed back to the starting point. Sometimes I would take a detour and go up to the top of Wildcat Peak on the way back, but that would take me over some very muddy trails. So, a nice 8 mile hike in a little under 4 hours. The weather started deteriorating that afternoon, so I’m glad I got an early start for my pre-Christmas hike.

Nothing planned for Christmas or the day after… it will pouring all weekend. I’d be lucky if I could get a short bike ride in at some point.