Ridge Open Space Preserve
In the foothills west of San Carlos and just north of Edgewood Park is the 293-acre Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District preserve, featuring a broad central meadow flanked by two wooded canyons. Cordilleras Creek originates in the preserve’s canyons and then flows east to the Bay near the end of Whipple Road, picking up volume from the streams in Edgewood Park.
Formerly the site of a tuberculosis hospital owned by the city of San Francisco, the area was purchased by MROSD in 1983. Residents of San Carlos approved a local tax on their assessed valuation to help fund the purchase.
Restoration efforts on this preserve have succeeded in reducing the number of non-native, invasive plant species, particularly eucalyptus, acacia, and broom. Volunteers and the California Conservation Corps worked with District personnel to re-seed several areas with native species to restore them to a more natural state. This project, begun in 1996, is an ongoing, probably 20-year effort.
Jurisdiction: Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District: 650-691-1200
Facilities: Trails for hikers and an off-leash area for dogs; Cordilleras Trail accessible to wheelchairs and hikers (no dogs)
Rules: Open dawn to dusk; dogs allowed on all trails and must be on maximum 6-foot leash, except in designated off-leash areas, where they must be under voice control; owners must clean up after their dogs
Maps: MROSD Pulgas Ridge OSP, USGS topo Woodside
How to Get There: From I-280 take Edgewood Rd. exit east and go 0.75 mile. Turn left on Crestview Dr. and immediately left again on Edmonds Rd. Around first curve, park at roadside turnout.
HIGH MEADOWLANDS LOOP
Hikers and their dogs will sample the best trails in this preserve.
Distance: 3-mile loop
Time: 1½ hours
Elevation Change: 400’ gain
From parking on Edmonds Road, walk through the entrance gate onto the 0.6-mile, fenced Cordilleras Trail on an easement beside the San Francisco Water Department road. This surfaced trail, accessible to wheelchairs, meets the paved service road that rises to the top of the preserve.
However, at this junction an unpaved trail goes right through a little glade on the east side of Cordilleras Creek. Here is a bench, installed by local Boy Scouts, in a willow-shaded clearing. From the bench, hikers can continue on the east side of the creek to the George Seagar Memorial Grove, where a plaque commemorates the first MROSD Ward 7 Director. He was instrumental in preserving this land for open space. Native live oaks, maples, and willows shade the peaceful scene, a pleasant destination for a short trip on a hot day
Returning toward the junction of the Cordilleras Trail, bear right on a small bridge across the creek and head uphill on the Polly Geraci Trail. This trail follows the creek near its west bank and then ascends on switchbacks through an oak forest. Ferns cover the hillside, and shade-loving flowers blossom here in spring. The authors try to visit this trail every spring to see the profusion of small, white, star-shaped blossoms of fetid adders tongue growing beside the trail.
Leaving the creek far below, the trail rounds a ridge where madrones and large, shiny-barked manzanitas appear in a tall chaparral cover. Here is a wooden bench shaded by evergreen oaks facing due north toward the chaparral-covered ridge across the canyon, now part of this preserve. A trail northeast along this ridge will someday join the San Francisco Watershed lands.
Farther along the trail you can look across the headwaters canyon of Cordilleras Creek and in rainy winters see a small waterfall tumbling over its headwall. The trail zigzags west and uphill until it finally breaks out in full chaparral scrub and joins the Hassler Trail at the top of the preserve’s high meadow. Some tall eucalyptus, remnants of the dense forest planted here years ago, still border this trail. If you turn right at this junction, you can walk 0.2 mile uphill to a clearing beside the Caltrans triple-fenced, circular Vista Point rest area.
Graceful ferns on a rotting tree stump in Pulgas Ridge Open Space Preserve
Returning to the paved Hassler Trail you will see immense oaks filling the deep canyons on the west side of the ridge. The trails planned for this canyon will someday bring a more intimate look at these lush forests.
On the left side of the trail is the site of the former health home, now a sloping meadow, capped by tall eucalyptus—a place to picnic and enjoy the views of San Francisco Bay through a notch in the foothills. South are Edgewood Park’s grasslands and wooded hilltop; west are the forested Santa Cruz Mountains.
Below the meadow is an off-leash dog run fenced with split-rails and circled by a surfaced road. Signs caution both dogs and dog owners to be on their best behavior.
Opposite the dog run and just off the edge of the trail are two large plots of cactus, probably remnants of a garden adjoining the site of the chief doctor’s former home.
As the surfaced Hassler Trail curves left downhill, watch for the Blue Oak Trail on your right. Take this trail down switchbacks through a lovely, mixed oak forest. Look for deep-red Indian Warriors and blue hound’s tongue as early as January— early augurs of spring. This delightful, 0.4-mile trail switchbacks down the canyon passing rivulets edged with moss-covered boulders and trailsides draped with maidenhair fern. A thoughtful Eagle Scout, Daemen Merrill, constructed a bench at a wide spot where you can rest, listen to many bird calls, and observe the differences in oak species. The dominant species is the live oak, Quercus agrifolia. The blue oak, Quercus douglasii, is deciduous, usually a much smaller tree, and has blue-green leaves that are not as prickly as the live oak. It is usually found on dry hillsides.
When the Blue Oak Trail emerges at Edmonds Road, on which you entered the preserve, turn left (northeast) to the parking area.
For a 1.1-mile loop, start from Edmonds Road on the Blue Oak Trail, bear right downhill on the Hassler Trail, and return to your car on the Cordilleras Trail. The shady ascent is just right for a hot day.
Edgewood County Park and Natural Preserve
This San Mateo County park of hilltops, gentle meadows, oak groves, and canyons faces the green expanse of the Skyline ridge to the west and looks out over the Bay to the east. It adjoins Pulgas Ridge Open Space Preserve just across Edgewood Road and the southern San Francisco Watershed lands across I-280. You can picnic here on a knoll listening to meadowlarks in the grass, climb a hill, or walk in cool, secluded glades.
Edgewood Park’s 467 acres, crowned by a wooded hill rising steeply from the surrounding meadows, had been set aside for a state college. After years of negotiation, the land was finally acquired for a park by San Mateo County and the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District in 1980. The county originally planned a golf course on the park’s grasslands with trails on the periphery, but in 1994 changed plans and declared Edgewood a park and natural preserve.
Implementation
