It had been nearly three weeks since I was last hiking and I needed to get out.
My left knee had been bothering me a great deal which led to the time off, but
it was doing somewhat better and I thought maybe some short hikes would be ok
for it. Though I've hiked all over the Bay Area, there are always some new,
minor summits to visit. I would spend much of the week visiting such points,
finding new parks and Open Space areas to visit, a few private property ones,
too. Today I headed to Upper San Leandro Reservoir in the East Bay hills in
Alameda County.
San Leandro Hills HP
The San Leandro Hills are a small subset of the East Bay hills which in turn
are a minor part of the Diablo Range. The highpoint of the San Leandro Hills
is found just off Redwood Rd which runs along the crest of Anthony Chabot
Regional Park. There is an unmarked TH just south of the summit off Redwood Dr,
where one finds an old, and parking for a few cars.
This trail can be followed north to
where it connects with the MacDonald Trail after about a mile. The highpoint,
however, is found after only five minutes on the trail, just off to the east
. There is a 1950 EBMUD , but otherwise
little to see. I walked around to the north side a short distance to see if
there was any place higher, but found nothing much in
aside from an old , probably left from a woodland
party amongst friends. I ran across a woman with her on
the trail as I emerged from the brush - she
probably wondered what the hell I was doing in there...
Peak 1,180ft / Peak 1,175ft
These two ranked summits are found at the northeast side of the Upper San
Leandro Reservoir, just south of the small town of Moraga. Lots of windy driving
got me to . An EBMUD trail system originates from the
park, through on its south side. I had purchased a $10 pass
(good for a year) online
earlier in the morning, having done my homework on this one. What wasn't clear
was whether one could legally hike to the summits which aren't along the regular
trail system. Short answer is "No, not legally," but otherwise there isn't much
concern for getting caught. After passing through more
on my way towards the Kings Canyon Loop Trail, I found
indicating a trail forking
right shy of the first mile. This side trail leads about halfway up the east
side of the peak before starting back down at a fork (
later I found this is
simply the return path of the Kings Canyon Loop Trail). The old ranch road
continuing up has a sign simply saying "Closed," but there is no fence or other
boundary marker. I went up anyways, soon finding at
another EBMUD surrounded by 4 stakes in a small clearing.
can be had by wandering out from under the summit trees,
but even then not all that great.
lies to the south across King Canyon, now flooded by the
reservoir. I returned to a flat clearing between the two peaks along the trail
where is found. Currently empty, I walked through the
yard and across found at the south side. I found no road or
any sort of trail leading higher, but luckily the slopes are mostly grass and
were still green to make the easy enough. Once I
reached , I picked up
a cow trail and eventually a little-used ranch road that headed west towards
the highpoint. Not quite reaching it, the road abruptly turns left to descend
another ridge, leaving the last quarter mile as a cross-country exercise through
more
tall grass. Unlike the previous two summits, Peak 1,175ft is open to
in including the town of Moraga to
the . There is another EBMUD here, too. It took
less than 20min to descend back via much the same route and return to
where I'd started. Having covered just over five
miles, that seemed about as much as I should foist on my knee, so I called it a
day though it was just noon. It didn't do badly, though, and I would do a few
more similar outings as the week progressed...