Stinson Beach to Mt Tamalpais and Back

I KNOW, it’s been really quiet for far too long around here. But, it’s with good cause. We bought a house at the beginning of February and have spent the past few months busying ourselves with moving and freaking out whenever we look at the bank account. And although I’ve had to sacrifice a few weekends of hiking and time with calipidder.com, I don’t think we could have picked a better time to move – the crappy weather winter hasn’t exactly had me motivated to be outside.

We’re now getting settled in and I’ve been able to slip out for some wildflower hikes and photography over the past few weeks. I hope to be back to my normal routine here shortly and I’ll go back and feature some trip reports from those hikes.

Steep Ravine Trail

First up is last weekend’s outing to Mt Tamalpais. Some friends proposed a hike I’ve always wanted to do – the round trip hike to the summit from Stinson Beach. There are a lot of trails to choose from on Mt Tam and our route ended up being around 16 miles for the round trip. Starting up the Dipsea Trail, we joined Steep Ravine and took it up to Pantoll. From here it was fire road all the way to the summit, but on the return trip we took a parallel single track that took us to the really cool outdoor Mountain Theater and eventually back down to Stinson Beach via the Matt Davis (Damon) Trail.

Matt Davis Trail

The variety of terrain and scenery on the mountain is great, from drippy and wet redwood forest to sunny and green rolling hillsides. We saw a lot of flowers, including the rare Calypso Orchid. I think we timed the trip perfectly – any other time of year it would have been either too muddy or too hot. Lots of flower photos to be found in the gallery at the link above!

Calypso Orchid

Style:

Loop dayhike

Distance:

16 miles round trip

Elevation Gain:

+/- 3200 ft

Trailhead and Permit Notes:

Since you’ll want to get an early start on this hike, parking at Stinson Beach shouldn’t be a problem. As of this writing, there are no fee or permit requirements for parking or doing this hike.