I visited Pinnacles National Park about three years ago. My visit was much too short last time and I'd had it on my radar for a while. Gil, always obliging when it comes to adventuring, was game for going too.
We were able to camp in the same campsite I had three years ago, almost to the day. Due to our late arrival Friday night and the forecasted rain, we slept in the back of the car. We were up early Saturday and headed out.
Our first adventure took us through Balconies Cave. The caves in Pinnacles are all talus caves, or caves created when large boulders fell on each other.
Gil going into the black abyss.
Kate's head poking out at the other end of the cave.
It was overcast and we got sprinkled on a few time but otherwise the temperature was great and the cloud cover quite pleasant.
I love the views from Pinnacles. I was hoping to be high enough to see the Pacific Ocean, but we were still to far from the coast.
We took a portion of the High Peaks Trail which included quite a few of these railed and foot-hold carved portions of the trail. These were especially fun to maneuver with some overly excited Boy Scouts running around on the trail.
We next headed down to Bear Gulch Reservoir.
Then through the Bear Gulch Caves.
I had wanted to go back up and over the High Peaks Trail but Gil wasn't too keen on going up in elevation again so we stayed along the valley floor. We had some fantastic green riparian vegetation along the trail.
We missed the middle section of the park and there are long 'wilderness' hikes on the north and south end of the central area of the park. I think we could easily hike all the trails in this park in another two visits. Plus, we didn't see the California Condors that call the park home. We'll just have to go back.
It was a wonderful weekend.
