I went out with the intention to finish hiking the remaining trails at Joseph D. Grant County Park today and being 100% done. I came pretty damn close. I started at the Grant Lake Parking lot and walked almost a mile on Mount Hamilton, where they were laying down fresh new asphalt, to reach the Washburn Trail trailhead. Then I walked to the barn. From there I hiked up to Tamien Trail and got lost at the end of that trail before coming back to Washburn. That’s when it got cold and overcast. I hustled the rest of the way on the Cañada de Pala and Los Huecos trails because it was getting close to closing time and I was afraid my car would get locked in the parking lot over night. Because I was in a rush I slipped coming downhill and scraped my right palm. It stung and got a little bloody but it wasn’t bad. It hurt more using the hand sanitizer when I got to my car. It was past closing time and luckily the gate wasn’t closed. I didn’t want to press my luck so I left. I’m gonna have to come back and do that remaining 1/10 of a mile on the Yerba Buena Trail in a few days and be 100% done hiking all of Grant Park.

I went to Ed R. Levin County Park for the first time on Sunday. I wanted to hike all of the Agua Caliente Trail but I had to turn around, with less than .6 miles to go, so I could be out of the park by closing time. It was beautiful. Saw lots of animals including 2 snakes, one on the trail and the other in the dog park being escorted out by security. I can’t wait to come back. I’ll probably start hiking all the trails at Ed R. Levin when I’m done with Joseph D. Grant.

My buddy and I went on a hike at Alum Rock Park this morning. We saw deer, ducks & fish as well as some cool human-made stuff. Tonight I did some new sketches based on an idea a few days ago for a possible future project. More on that later.

My legs were no longer sore and I was feeling good so I went on hike at Alum Rock Park. The South Rim Trail, from the No Horse Bridge to the Sycamore Switchback Trail, reopened after being closed all of last year so I hiked that. I saw some wildlife feasting, drew in my sketchbook a few times, and found spring water bubbling out of a hole in one of the parking lots. When I got in my car to leave I felt something on the back of my neck and found it was a little green worm. Gross!
At 7.43 miles, and almost 1,000 ft of elevation, this was a great warm up for my upcoming hike at Joseph D. Grant County Park. Hopefully my legs aren’t completely dead tomorrow.

I went on my first hike in over a month. I went to Grant County Park to finish the Smith Creek Trail and crossed the water this time. I slowly and carefully stepped on the big rocks and made my way across the creek without falling or getting my boots wet. When I reached the end of the trails I sat down beside the creek and drew in my sketchbook for half an hour. I drew one of the big rocks sticking out of the water. After a month of no hiking I’m a little out of practice and will need to hike other trails to prepare for my final hike at Grant to be 100% complete.

The weather has been cold & rainy since I got back from my trip on Wednesday. I’m so close to being done with Grant County Park.

We went to the Aloha Animal Sanctuary and fed some goats, sheep, pigs, ducks & chickens today.

We’re going to go volunteer at an animal sanctuary for a few hours Saturday morning.

We saw a snail with a funky shell on our Sunday morning walk. It looked just like me.

We came a across a busted up centipede in the middle of the sidewalk Monday evening.

A predawn hike at Makapu’u Lighthouse to catch the sunrise then a trip to Lanikai Beach for a little bit of swimming, snorkeling and laying out in the sun.

We went cruising around the island today.

I knocked out 10 miles of new trails Monday afternoon at Grant Park. That leaves me with approximately 5 miles of trails to hike before I can say I’ve hiked all of Joseph D. Grant County Park.

I went on a 7.59 mile hike today and I’m closing in on my goal of hiking every trail at Joseph D. Grant County Park. I still have about 15.5 miles of trails to cover, not including the distance to reach those trails. I’m hoping I can finish in the next 2-3 visits.

I went back to Grant County Park today after 10 days of cold, wet & windy weather. I set out hike the .2 miles of Eagle Trail, between the Brush and Cañada de Pala trails, that I missed the last time I was there. After covering that short stretch I headed north-east on Cañada de Pala till it crossed the San Felipe Creek. After a week and a half of rain there was now a flowing stream. I didn’t want to risk falling in or getting my boots soaked so I stopped there. I didn’t go back right away. I stayed a while and drew in my sketchbook. Soon after, a lady came down the trail from the other side of the creek. She sounded surprised to see the water too. I asked if it was her first time on this trail and she said yeah. She then hiked up her pants and crossed the creek by stepping on two rocks sticking out of the water. Like a boss! After she walked away I started drawing out the scene in my little sketchbook.

I hiked a few new trails at Joseph D. Grant County Park and took some pictures. I’m almost done hiking every trail there. It’ll probably take me 3-4 trips to cover the perimeter and a couple more to hike the trails I missed.

I stayed up way past my bed time drawing this. Enjoy the time lapse video below.

Not really. Just a little bit of doodling after a long hiatus.

I did some cleaning, organizing, a few loads of laundry, a bit of online shopping, played some old video games and sketched this on the iPad...

I visited Henry Cowell State Park today for the first time. I went with some friends. We parked somewhere along highway 9 and moved fast towards the San Lorenzo river. By the time we reached the water we’d already gone on a few sketchy trails and we were gonna go on more questionable trails along the river towards The Garden Of Eden. A few of us didn’t feel comfortable going that way so we all turned back the way we came then followed the train tracks to the swimming hole. There were a few people there, including an annoying group playing music really loud on their portable speaker. We hung out for a little while before following the train tracks some more then heading back to our cars. The maps I brought, and my phone’s gps, weren’t very helpful because we didn’t enter through any of the designated entrances and there weren’t any trail markers anywhere. I still had fun but next time I’ll come better prepared and take my time and really enjoy it.

It feels like an adventure, exploring new places with the help of a map. Instead of carrying a sword I got a small pocket knife. My phone’s gps serves as my compass. Grant Park has wild pigs and Hyrule has moblins. Today (Wednesday) I came across a hallowed out tree that looked like the the entrance to level 1 from the original Legend of Zelda for the NES. I was wearing my Zelda: Wind Waker mask today too FTW.

This is my 500th blog post! It'd be cool if I had some profound shit to write about. Instead I'm sharing the collection of maps I've printed, highlighted and carried with me on my hikes over the last couple months. I've thrown them away and fished them out of the trash at least twice now and I'm still not sure what I'm going to do with them.

The whole thing started after Covid struck and my gym was forced to close. I started going to Lake Cunningham Park to walk & run until that got boring so I started hiking the Eagle Rock Trail at Alum Rock Park. I kept hiking the same trail over & over till I decided to explore the rest of the park. In November I decided I was going to hike every trail at Alum Rock before the end of the year. I finished Alum Rock sooner than expected and moved on to the Sierra Vista Open Space Preserve and managed to hike all those trails before New Years. Now I'm working on completing Joseph D. Grant County Park and I'm about 1/4 to 1/3 of the way done. Since Grant Park is so big, and has tons of trails, I've been selecting my route and printing a portion of the map (middle pic) to carry in my pocket. When I get back home I highlight the trails I hiked that day on to the full map (bottom.) I'm hoping to finish Grant Park in February and starting someplace new. I'm thinking Ed R. Levin Park.

I’m making it sound a lot cooler than it really is but I went on a 6 mile hike this afternoon and covered new trails, bringing me a tiny bit closer to completing the whole park. I saw a few animal bones, large moss covered rocks, a fallen tree obstructing a bike trail, a tree that looks like it belongs on a motivational poster, the ass-end of huge grasshopper or something and views of Lick Observatory & the valley below from the top of the Yerba Buena Trail. When I left the park I drove further up Mount Hamilton Road to check out the Twin Gates parking lot & trail head and the Smith Creek Fire Station. On the way I up a saw a coyote eating a dead snake on the side of the road (see video) then again posing for sunset photos on my way back down.