Made in The Shade - Bear Valley to Five Brooks (June 23)

Our first hike after the "official" start of summer last weekend was indeed a summery outing. Last week we hiked in Palomarin under cloudy skies that kept the temperatures cool enough for us to have an enjoyable trek up the coast and back. The National Weather Service had predicted a comfortable 69 degree high for our walk up the Olema Valley from Bear Valley to Five Brooks, but Mother Nature decided to heat things up by another ten degrees and we could tell when we left the Bear Valley parking lot that we were in for a warm day.

But before we started hiking, we made a rendezvous at Five Brooks to stroll around the little lake near the parking lot to look for dragonflies and damselflies. Wendy managed to snare a couple of these winged marvels in the morning (we'd see many more when we returned to the pond at the end of the hike). Some of us got a quick peek at a male Wood duck (we spotted him again when we got back to Five Brooks in the afternoon). (Click here to read about the flora and fauna we saw when he did this hike last year on May 27th).

About an hour after we met up at Five Brooks, we'd shuttled back to Bear Valley and were making our way across the grassy fields south of the parking lot and on our way down the valley. By then it was warm enough to shed shirts and jackets and turn our zip-off pants into shorts as the summer sun beat down on our heads. Luckily for us, there is a lot of shade along the trail and most of the wide-open areas are located along a 1.5 mile stretch between Bear Valley and the end of the Vedanta Society property which we transited between 10:45 and 11:45 am. An even that section has shady spots here and there.

Last year we did this hike about a month earlier and the grasses in this area were still quite green. But this year most had turned a golden brown. When we crossed the Vedanta Society land, a small herd of Black Angus cattle lolled under a large tree. We saw them in the same place last year. Since they didn't appear to have moved in over a year, maybe they were just specimens from a long-closed bovine wax museum that had been "put out to pasture."

Most of this trail is level or follows a gentle uphill grade so, true to our name, we just meandered along a leisurely pace most of the way. A little under two hours after we started out from Bear Valley we reached a fine open meadow and plopped done in the shade of several large trees to have lunch. (Last year it was cool enough for us to sit out in the full sun in this same spot). Water drains into a nearby low spot creating a damp place where cattails can grow and provide ideal habitat for the many Red-winged Blackbirds that we saw flitting among the reeds.

A little after 1 o'clock we reluctantly gave up lounging around and chatting, threw our packs back on our backs, and headed on to Five Brooks. About 45 minutes later we reached the Stewart Horse Camp. Last year we saw several pickups and horse trailers here, but this time there was just one lone truck and a single horse.

After another 10 minutes of walking we were back at the pond at Five Brooks. The drivers who had left their cars at Bear Valley headed back there to retrieve them while the rest of us went bug and bird watching before settling down at a shaded picnic table near the parking lot to wait for the caravan to return and carry us home.