Today I planned to hike in the Tilden Nature Area to Wildcat Canyon Regional Park.  I have a book called 101 Hikes in Northern California by Matt Heid , published by Wilderness Press.  I am trying to hike all of the trails in the book. I am not doing them in any particular order.  Today’s hike is #17 in the book.  Let me just say that this book has given me great ideas of where to hike but some of the directions are hard to follow.  Past experiences have taught me to look at several different maps to make sure I have a better idea of where to go.  I did bring a map along.  I picked up my friend Teemaree.  The traffic was slow and I got lost, so by the time we arrived at the park we decided to take a different route.  I will have to hike the route from the book another day.

From the parking lot we took the Jewel Lake trail to the Wildcat Peak Trail.  The hope was to connect to the Laurel Canyon Trail but instead we reached the Nimitz Way.  A man told us that the Laurel Canyon Trail was just down the road/trail.  We followed that road (Nimitz Way) for quite a while.  I soon realized we must have missed the trail.  We just kept going until the trail ended at Wildcat Canyon Road.  After studying the map we took the Curran trail to Meadows Canyon Trail down to Lone Oak picnic area and the road led us back to our car.

The hike ended up being 5.71 miles.  It took about 2 hrs.  My friends will tell you I don’t mind getting lost or trying new trails.  We always find our way home and in the process see some new places.  That is what I love about hiking, it’s always something unique and beautiful. You could take the same trail but depending on the weather, it may not look the same.  Tilden Park is beautiful. There are so many great trails to explore.  It brought back a lot of fond memories of when I used to bring my kids to the Little Farm to feed the animals and then to hike around.  The hike we took today might not work for a family with small kids but there are several other hikes like the Jewel Lake Trail that would work.

Meadow Canyon Trail , Tilden park