Description
Casey, Sara and I went on a short hike at
Hidden Villa
(in Los Altos Hills,
off Moody Road) on the day after Christmas. We had everything from
sun, dramatic clouds, very brief rain, and a short hail storm.
(For those with kids, or friends with kids, it's a great place,
with a small working farm, organic garden, and animals, mostly goats
and cows). Also has a hostel that was just recently rebuilt.
We started off up Adobe Creek, following it up to the Ewing trail, then
crossed over into Rancho San Antonio near the intersection of the Black
Mountain trail. On our way up to Black Mountain we suddenly heard what
we thought was rain, but which turned out to be very small hail, about
2 mm in diameter (see the picture of some on Sara's glove on page 2). It
quickly turned into somewhat larger hail, "small pea-sized" (see the last
picture on this page with Casey's foot as reference, also first pictures
on page 2).
After the hail, we got very brief rain, then back to alternating sun and
cloud-shadow. It kept getting colder... We stopped for a snack at the powerline
crossing, where we had sun most of the time. It quickly clouded up and got
even colder, so we headed back down, trying to warm up again, and talking
about Thai food.
We passed our first trail junction, and headed down the Grapevine trail,
then switched to the Ridge trail, for some nice views, and a wreath hanging
on a gate, near the top of the hill (last picture on page 2).
Then it was down the Hostel trail, and back to the cars (pictures on page 3).
Unfortunately, Thai Gardens was closed, so were almost all the restaurants in
Los Altos (it was around 3pm), and even most of the places on Castro St., so
we finally settled on burgers at the Tied House. A nice end to a rather unusual
day...
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Hidden Villa 2003-12-26 |
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Click on image to see 800x600 version |
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| Looking down
Adobe Cr. near the
Toyon Trail |
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| Toyon
(Christmas Berry) on
Ewing trail |
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| Toyon
(Christmas Berry) on
Ewing trail |
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| Looking back
down Adobe Cr from
Ewing trail |
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| Clouds over
Black Mt trail |
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| Looking over
Hidden Villa at the
Rancho San Antonio
boundary |
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Mushroom on Black
Mt. trail |
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| Hail
on Black Mt trail,
with Casey's shoe
for scale |
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Hikers
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