60 Hikes Within 60 Miles: San Francisco: Including Santa Rosa, Oakland, and San Jose

60 Hikes Within 60 Miles

by Jane Huber

Bay Area parks and preserves offer a dramatic variety of landscapes, from rugged redwood-forested canyons to breezy coastal bluffs, grassy rolling hills to sunny chaparral-coated hillsides. Well-known destinations such as Point Reyes National Seashore, Mount Diablo State Park, Mount Tamalpais State Park, and many other more obscure jewels of the Bay Area park system are just a short drive from the heart of San Francisco. 60 Hikes Within 60 Miles: San Francisco guides readers to a splendid assortment of trails in the 9 counties surrounding one of the world's most beautiful cities. A gentle Mediterranean climate encourages year round hiking and provides such seasonal splendors as carpets of colorful wildflowers, rushing waterfalls, and creekbeds littered with maple and oak leaves. Whether hikers crave a quick and easy get-out-of-town stroll or a challenging day-long trek through wilderness, this book is the perfect trailblazer, for City natives and first-time visitors alike.

Genres: Travel, Reference, Outdoors, Science Fiction, Guidebook

280 pages, Paperback

First published December 10, 2003

About the author

Jane Huber grew up in Sussex County, New Jersey. She graduated from Boston University and lived in Brooklyn before moving to San Francisco in 1991. Huber has worked as a library page, Action Park lifeguard, waitress, editorial assistant, recipe tester, department store sales associate, cooking school office manager, barista, and bookstore clerk. She once lost a job offer by sharing an (apparently) unpopular opinion about her favorite novel. An avid hiker since the mid-1990’s, Huber created the Bay Area Hiker (www.bahiker.com) website in 1999. With photos and descriptions of more than 250 hikes, Bay Area Hiker was described by Jon Carroll in the San Francisco Chronicle as “an obsessively complete guide for hikers.” Huber lives with her husband and son in a San Francisco neighborhood where coyotes stroll the streets in the middle of day.

Reviews

[Pooja Desai · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love hiking! I got this book after I moved to SF, as a guide. Like the format of the book, for each hike it tells you difficulty, mileage, a short description of the trail, good season to visit, if the trail is covered/ exposed and map. I always supplement it with the AllTrails app to confirm the info. So far I have done only 5 of 60 hikes, but I plan to do them all!

[Michael Huen · Rating 2 out of 5]

When I first discovered this book I thought it was exactly what I was looking for. 60 hikes within 60 miles of SF? AMAZING concept; however, the book designer and author have forgotten to include actual addresses or maps of where the hiking trails are. For instance, if I turn to the hiking trail labeled "Loch Lomond Recreation Area", a trail I've never heard of, I have no clue of where this place is located. Yes it's 60 miles of SF but which city is in? Instead of simply putting the city within the key-information box you have to read through the descriptions and directions. This makes the skimming experience really unsatisfying. I checked the table of contents to see if it was organized by city but it's not. So if you're looking for a book to skim through to find a good hike, this isn't for you. I did look at the website of the author and it seems much more intuitive (http://bahiker.com/)

If you can overlook this huge problem, the book is everything I want it to be. There is a short summary of the hiking trails and also a box of key information. The inclusion of trail maps and key-information is the best aspect of the book. Unfortunately I can't overlook the absence of address quick viewing.

[Cadillacrazy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has many great hikes around the San Francisco Bay Area. There are a range of levels of difficulty, and the info on each hike is highly detailed and informative.

I love to layout and information this book provides. at each hike, there is a list of essential info; Length, difficulty, scenery, water required, trail traffic, surface, time, facilities, and usually lets you know if dogs are allowed (I found one of the four hikes that I went on out of this book that did allow dogs, but was not mentioned in the book).

I found that of the four hikes I've done so far in this book, the information was mostly correct, but I would personally like to see less "cakewalk" rated hikes and more challenging options. One of the hikes I went on the instructions lacked a few key info like the fact that the road we were supposed to stay on for 2.5 miles turned in several places, and was not well marked. I always supplement with instructions online before I go anywhere, so it wasn't really a problem.

I also have the Sacramento version of the 60 hikes series, and really like that one as well.

[Gail · Rating 5 out of 5]

We've only tried one hike in here so far: the Mitchell Canyon--Eagle Peak loop at Mount Diablo. It did deliver beautiful wildflowers in spring as promised, including the yellow fairy lantern which is only found at Mount Diablo. Be warned that the "strenuous" rating in the book is accurate. Usually trails marked "strenuous" usually aren't that bad in other books, but the last two miles of this trail were definitely strenuous: descending nearly 2000 feet down a narrow, rocky, steep trail at times precariously perched on the edge of the steep hillside. Beautiful views and flowers, but probably best done in the reverse direction from what she recommends. Going up the narrow, rocky bit would probably have been much easier than going down. I don't want to scare anyone away from this book - there are only four trails included that are listed as "strenuous" and one "moderate to strenuous". We are still looking forward to doing as many of the 60 hikes as we can during our stay in the Bay Area. Still gave it four stars because we were warned of what we were getting into and it was a beautiful hike.

[Jennifer Tse · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't think this book is that useful, because I won't actually go on all 60 hikes. However, it does give a good overview of the various hikes around SF. I like the description about Mount Tamalpais. However, sometimes there are 2-3 hikes about the same park, which makes the title kind of deceptive. I thought the title means that there are 60 different hikes in 60 different places... I also got kind of confuse about one of the headings. It listed hikes that are accessible with public transportation, but there are NO direction/information about riding public transportation except for the Angel Island island- which you have to take the ferry anyways since there is no way to drive there. The content is a disappointment from the pumped up summary on the back cover... didn't end up finish reading the book.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think that free website bahiker.com (by same author) is in many ways as useful as this book. However I have this book to thank for making it easy to get into regular hiking without having to do much searching around for hike ideas. Now that I'm more experienced, some of the hikes in the book are a bit shorter/easier than I am looking for, but the included trail maps and elevation profiles are very good (and not featured on the bahiker website). I'm glad I invested in this book even though now I often need to look elsewhere to find exactly the kind of hike I'm looking for.

[Jason Landsborough · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a fairly good book describing various hikes in the San Francisco Area. I particularly liked any background or historical information the author gave on particular areas.

This book (future editions?) could benefit from additional pictures and illustrations. For example, the author frequently mentioned seeing various plant and wildlife. It would have been helpful to have some idea of what the plant or animal looked like, particularly for species that are rare.

[Karen Zachary · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best book I've ever purchased. I'd had both editions. This book has given me a ridiculous amount of blissful hiking hours on trails I would have never found myself. Great info, including a cool elevation chart. I am eternally grateful to this author.

[Dorothy Greco · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must have for those who intend to make use of the trails and hikes avail in the Bay area. Huber obviously loves nature. It shines through her writing and attention to detail. Also includes lovely photos.

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of really great hikes in the Bay Area.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I used bahiker.com (site by the author of the book) often before this book came out. This book and the site are both awesome for picking hikes to do around the Bay Area.

[Francis Calugay · Rating 5 out of 5]

For the beginner-moderate hikers out there, I recommend this book. Very descriptive and informative.