Taking the long way back
By Austin Explorer on 2/15/2015
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Distance: 10.67 Miles Duration: 4 hours, 37 minutes
Coppertone and I had intended to put in perhaps 7.5 or 8 miles, but we ended up hiking over 10 due to a navigation error on our part.
Throughout of the loop that we chose we would always hear the gunfire from the nearby gun range. It wasn't overly loud, but a near constant companion.
The trail map for the park does lead to some confusion since there appears to be some discrepencies. For example, the map shows Two Rocks paralleling a paved road for some distance when in fact it appears that Two Rocks merges with the raod instead. When we got to Hawk Ridge it was a little confusing to figure out the proper route to take to get down to the Columbine Trail. The answer: head towards Lookout Ridge and look for the trail marker to the right of the lookout.
Near the start of our hike along Two Rocks Trail we walked through some of the largest stands of Eucapyptus trees that we'd encountered. Later in the hike along the lake shore we could look up and see the dividing line between the mono culture Eucaplytus on top and the more varied plant mix on the slopes leading down to the water.
In the hills above Lake Chabot there's a bit of solitude to be had, but down at the lake level the crowds build up. The density of people is particularly thick around the marina.
A dog owner had not too long ago lost a pet due its ingestion of water containing a toxic blue/green algae in the lake water. Although it varied somewhat from section to section, the lake's waters were quite green and did not look inviting to touch at all.
We ended our hike by climbing back up on the plateau from where we started via Live Oak Trail. We could have renamed to it Dead Hiker Trail at that point!