Editor’s note: This story, which is featured in our Aug. 30 “Bay Area Outdoors” premium magazine, was written before the CZU Complex Fires devastated this part of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Eventually, you’ll be able to retrace the gorgeous Skyline-to-the-Sea trail once more. Meanwhile, you can experience it vicariously through reporter Maggie Angst’s prose and see what this magnificent landscape looked like in July via photographers Karl Mondon and Ray Chavez’s images.
It’s not the first time I’ve found myself in this position — 20 miles into a run or hike, feeling as if my knees could crumble to dust, dealing with the reality that there’s a long road ahead.
But to explain how I wound up trying to complete one of the most grueling thru-trails in the Bay Area in a single day in July, in the middle of a pandemic, we’ll have to backtrack a bit.
The Skyline-to-the-Sea trail is a roughly 33-mile trail that takes you from the crest of the Santa Cruz Mountains above Saratoga into Big Basin Redwoods State Park and shoots you out in front of the Pacific Ocean at Waddell State Beach.
Along the way, the trail offers ridgetop vistas while weaving through dozens of giant old-growth redwood tree groves and passing by rushing creeks and waterfalls.
Most people who conquer the full trek do it over the course of two to three days — spending the night at backcountry trail camps along the way.
Due to the coronavirus pandemic, however, those camps are currently closed. So I — along with my trusty friend Justin — decided to briskly trek the trail in one day … and hopefully live to tell the story.
In our defense, many of the trail reviews have the length at 25 miles. What we didn’t realize: The whole journey would take us across 33 miles over the span of 10½ hours.
Nevertheless, this expedition presented me an excuse to both get lost in the wilderness for a full day and vanquish the bad luck 2020 had unleashed on my body.
Five months ago, I underwent knee surgery after taking a bad spill on a Tahoe ski trip. A couple months later — while still rehabbing the knee — I fractured several bones in my face after falling off my bicycle. With two major injuries and a pandemic, I think I’ve moved my body less this year than any in recent memory. I felt ready for a revival.
And so I set off with Justin, who graced me with sing-a-longs, laughter and much-needed motivation at several points along our journey — including my minor panic attack after getting stung by a bee for the first time at mile 10.
We began our trek at 8 a.m. at the start of the trail near the vista point at Saratoga Gap at the intersection of Highways 9 and 35.
One of my favorite points came between the 3- and 4-mile marks as the trail crossed Highway 9, offering a panoramic view of the Santa Cruz mountain range — the ridges of the mountains peeking out above a thick layer of fog that filled the valley below.
As we descended through the fog and into dense forests below, a gentle mist filled the air, glistening as sunbeams peeked through holes in the tree canopy above. At this point, every new sight and sound and bug we discovered was noteworthy — including a banana slug. I even cracked jokes about how easy it was so far and that the 25 miles I thought we were on track for were “nothing” — a comment I later came to regret.
From there, we began passing through our first large redwood groves — stopping to take pictures of how small we looked standing next to the magnificent structures — and Waterman Gap Trail Camp, where many backpackers spend their first night about nine miles in from the trailhead.
After hours of making our way through the shaded and dense forest, we crossed China Grade Road at about roughly 12-13 miles in, and the scenery gave way to a completely new landscape. The trail went from compacted dirt and leaves to sand and rock and sandstone slabs.
We were hit with some of the first direct sunlight of the trail and encountered small shrubbery and large rock outcrops. Here we started our first round of sing-a-longs — staying on theme with “The Climb” by Miley Cyrus — as we passed the first other hikers we saw on the trail. Unfortunately, they did not join our music making.
After our short stint in the sun, we descended back into the shaded, cool comfort of the forest and down to the basin floor to discover the largest redwood trees we’d see along our journey.
The awe of the towering trees helped distract us from the lactic acid building in our legs and the stinging bee bites we had each sustained. But then we reached a trail update near mile 19 at the Big Basin Headquarters. A portion of the trail was closed, so we were sent on a brief detour route if we wanted to continue on the trail and get to our next stop — Berry Creek Falls. Minor bummer, I thought.
But below it, it read: “Waddell Beach: 12 miles.”
That was six more miles than we thought we signed up for, in addition to the newly discovered detour that would also add on some extra mileage.
I knew this experience would make me feel invincible later — already having walked nearly 20 miles, now surrounded by redwood groves, luscious ferns and a rushing river — but for the next five miles, I regrettably lost that foresight. Instead, self-doubt consumed me.
It wasn’t until I could see and hear Berry Creek Falls — one of the main sights along the trail that I had been waiting more than six hours to see — that the negative thoughts began to fade.
Although you can see the 70-foot waterfall from a vista point right on the trail, we continued on a short trail to see the falls from a viewing point right underneath, which was a great spot for a snack. Looking back now, it was the first time we had stopped and rested for more than 15 minutes at any point during the entire journey. A few more stops would have been wise.
From there, the rest of the hike — a 7 to 8-mile, mostly flat trail — was probably the easiest portion of the whole trek, despite the limp in my gait that was beginning to form after 25 miles of hiking.
When we finally could see a glimpse of the ocean — and my Hyundai Elantra awaiting us at the end — it was a sight to behold. I capped it off with a dip of the toes in the ocean waves, and a flood of disbelief that we had just trekked all 33 miles of the Skyline-to-the-Sea trail.
Would I recommend hiking it all in one day? Probably not, but you do what you’ve got to do during a pandemic.
Would I recommend backpacking it — when it’s allowed — or breaking it up into portions for day hikes at a pace that allows for taking in the views?
Absolutely.
