Irises galore on the Estero Trail (Point Reyes, California)

Sarah & I did our annual hike on the Estero Trail in Point Reyes on Sunday, and as we have for the past 4 years, had a lovely time. After a tasty breakfast at the Pine Cone Diner we drove through lovely Inverness, arriving at the nearly-empty Estero Trailhead just before 11.

The Estero Trail starts off through green hills, making a bee-line for a cluster of mixed forest. We saw our first Great Horned Owl in this forest a few years ago, and were keeping a sharp eye out for movement, but no owls were seen (not that we should have been expecting them to be active at noontime!). We did see a Woodpecker, which flew off before I could get a good enough look to identify it, and many birds were singing, but none that I know by song (this isn’t saying much – birding by ear is something I need to work on!).

Emerging from the forest we crossed a bridge over one of the “fingers” of Drake’s Estero (it’s rather hand-shaped, as this google map shows). Some shorebirds foraged in the mud, some peeps, Semi-palmated Plovers, many Willets, a few Mallards, and the occasional Western Gull.

Brass Buttons bloomed trailside as we started up the first of several small hills. A Ceanothus bush was buzzing with bees, paintbrush clung to the hillsides, and Cow Parsnip was going to town, with its huge white blooms everywhere. A few lupine bushes were also blooming here, as was Pacific Pea, a couple of California Hedgenettle, Twinberry, a small patch of Crimson Columbine, and some nearly-seeded Miner’s Lettuce.

Up the next hillside, Douglas Iris was in full bloom, with thousands of lovely purple flowers scattered in clumps as far as the eye could see. I never cease to be amazed at how variable and beautiful this little wild iris is! Its relative, Blue-eyed Grass, was also growing, mostly in the disturbed soil along the trail, and I saw just a couple of Pussy Ears, my favorite lily, in bloom by a cow gate. I have only seen this hairy little member of genus Calochortus on this trail, and on this particular hill, never anywhere else!

Continuing down to the next mini-valley, a pretty blue snake scurried away into the brush as we approached, and a Song Sparrow welcomed us with its lovely trill. There were fewer flowers here, especially compared to the first hill, but Irises were abundant, as they are for nearly all of this hike.

We’d hoped that the dry spring season would make the third hillside less muddy, as it has always been a mess from cow crossings on our previous visits, but no, it was still pretty mucky and stinky. I’ll save my ranting about allowing grazing on National Park land for another day…. Shortly after the mire in the trail we came to a fork, and a decision had to be made. To continue 1.5 miles to Sunset Beach, or turn left and hike all the way out to Drake’s Head (perhaps 2+ miles, one way). Since it was a breezy day, and Drake’s Head has been extremely gusty on each of our visits, we decided to hike to Sunset Beach.

The trail to Sunset Beach is a grassy, gently downhill double-track that’s a pleasure to walk on, and featured some different flora than the first section of trail: Dwarf Checkerbloom, white Asters, Rosy Sandcrocus (also an Iris relative), several types of Clover, and Pale Flax featured most prominently, along with the ever-present Irises. Red-winged Blackbirds kept us company, chipping and singing from what seemed like every other bushtop!

We soon arrived at Sunset Beach and walked toward the sand along a use trail, following a drainage into the bay. Little bank-dwelling crabs scurried into their dens as we walked by, cautiously sticking out a claw to see if it was safe after we’d passed. Past a patch of Iceplant, we found the same large piece of driftwood that we’d had lunch on two years prior and decided it was as good of a place now as it had been then.

As before, Yellow Sand-Verbena was blooming all around us. This globular member of the Four-O-Clock family has hairy leaves and small trumpet-like flowers arranged in an almost perfect sphere. Some foraging birds on a sand bar in the distance didn’t look quite familiar so I looked through Sarah’s binocular, and sure enough, a flock of Brants (LIFER!) were dabbling in the estuary.

We settled into our lunch of sandwiches and chips from our favorite bakery in SF (Boulange de Cole in Cole Valley), mini bottles of wine, and enjoyed the quietness. A couple of hikers walked by on the beach, but we were otherwise completely alone, listening to the ocean crash in the distance (Sunset Beach is on Drake’s Bay, not the ocean), the gulls crying, and a herd of seal lions barking.

I walked down the beach a short ways to get a better look at the Brants and saw perhaps a half-dozen Great Egrets feeding in the sand as well. After 20 minutes or so, we re-shouldered our packs and headed back the way we came.

The only thing I don’t like about this otherwise near-perfect hike is that it’s an out-and-back, but so it goes. I stopped a few times on the return trip to test out my new extension tubes on my 70-200 f/4L lens – they work very strangely, seeming to all but disable the zoom, and they completely kill infinity focus, limiting one to a very small focus range. I found it easiest to use the zoom to focus, then the focus ring to fine-tune, but I need more practice to get a feel for what size objects call for which combination of tubes.

Our return hike was mostly uneventful, save for seeing a Common Raven fly off with a 3-foot-long green snake in its claws, and a woman leading a blind man on a hike, which was very cool to see, since they were several miles in. This is quite a sensory hike, and I would think lack of sight wouldn’t much detract from it since there is so much to touch, smell, and hear too! A pair of mother cows with their calves flanked the trail at one point; I’m not usually bothered chasing cows out of my way, but when they’re with young, more caution is called for. I slowly approached, clapping and loudly saying “Shoo, cow!” and they eventually ran off.

We got back tot he car at 4:00, for almost exactly a 5-hour hike. This remains one of my very favorite hikes in the Bay Area – there’s so much wildlife, and such a great variety of wildflowers, that the fact that it’s 1) about 8 miles round-trip and 2) is an out-and-back, hardly bothers at all.

Hike Stats:
Distance: 8 miles
Hiking time: 3h 27m
Stopped time: 1h 32m
Climbing: 900′ says my GPS, but that seems a little high

See also my photo gallery from previous hikes here.

Birds seen:

Wildflowers seen:

– American Goldfinch – Anna’s Hummingbird – Black Phoebe * Brant – California Quail – Common Raven – Double-crested Cormorant – Great Blue Heron – Great Egret – Mallard – Mourning Dove – Osprey – Peeps sp. – Red-tailed Hawk – Red-winged Blackbird + Semi-palmated Plover – Song Sparrow – Turkey – Vulture – Western Gull – Western Scrub-Jay – White-crowned Sparrow – White-tailed Kite – Willet – Woodpecker sp. * = life bird, + = year bird

– Alfalfa – Aster sp. (various) – Beach(?) Strawberry – Bird’s-foot Trefoil – Blue-eyed Grass – Brass Buttons – California Blackberry – California Buttercup – California Hedgenettle – California Manroot – Ceanothus sp. – Coast Sun Cups – Cow Parsnip – Crimson Columbine – Douglas Iris – Dwarf Chckerbloom – English Plantain – Ice Plant – Lupine sp. (various) – Miner’s Lettuce – Morning Glory – Pacific Pea – Pacific Potentilla – Pale Flax – Pussy Ears – Rosy Sandcrocus – Scarlet Pimpernel – Scotch Broom – Sheep Sorrel – Spring Vetch – Sticky Cinquefoil – Sticky Monkeyflower – Tomcat Clover – Twinberry – Western Thimbleberry – White Lawn Clover – Witches Teeth – Yellow Sand-Verbena