Hiking the Dipsei Trail

Last weekend my husband and I packed our backpacks and headed to the coast with our friends, the Fry's. We all love hiking so I picked one of my favorite places to take everyone to hike. As outdoorsy as the Fry's and my husband are, I was surprised to find that none of them had hiked the Dipsei Trail. The Dipsei runs for miles through the bay area I believe from Mill Valley to Marin. One of my favorite parts starts at Stinson Beach and goes 1800 feet up in about 3 miles along Steep Ravine trail to Pantoll Ranger Station and then rolls back down to the beach on the Matt Davis trail. I've run this loop before. It's tough but so gorgeous. The loop is 7.5 miles but you can add to that at the top if you want. As you know by now, Jen and Cory are avid hikers as well. They haven't done this hike either! I can't wait for them to check it out. Here are a few shots of some of the scenery.

This crazy tree curved all the way over the trail. So cool!

This particular stretch of the loop takes you in and out of the forest. Like I said, it climbs 1800 feet in less than 3 miles. When we parked at the beach there was a cloud cover rolling in but it hadn't reached us yet. Once we started climbing, we looked down and could see this thick layer of clouds hovering over the beach. We could hear the waves crashing on Stinson but could not see the ocean at all. It was wild. We were in total sun, sweating, taking off layers and down below was covered in clouds. I hope you can see the cloud cover in these photos.
The above and below photos were taken within minutes of each other. So crazy! I love bay area weather, you never know what you're going to get. Isn't this hillside gorgeous! Ahhhhh.....

We finished in about 3 hours and then headed to the beach for a picnic. Stinson Beach is an adorable little town.
We hung out on the beach for a while. When we got down there the sky was completely whited out. We watched the cover move South while the guys played football on the beach. It was warm and there were tons of people playing in the water. This photo isn't very interesting but I wanted you to see how white the sky was. We couldn't see the hills a few hundred feet away. Eventually the cloud cover rolled out and it was absolutely glorious.

SHARK ALERT! There are shark warning signs all over Stinson Beach. Curt Fry and my husband have no fear of anything and decided to body surf the irresistable waves for a while. This was on Saturday. On the following Monday, authorities closed down the beach for 3 days because a large Great White shark was spotted near the beach! Yikes! S0 while I highly recommend the hiking in the area, the swimming....not so much! -Carie