INCH Hike: Rock House Ridge

1272. Rock House Ridge (11/06/21)

Hikers (26): Adam, Baltazar, Bjorn, Brad, Christina, Crystal, David A, Ellen, Gela, George, Giulia, Hong, Jeff, Jim, Kathryn, Lina, Manfred, Mihail, Milon, Peter, Qi, Rudi, Sarbinder, Shuli, Sophie, Yipeng
Distance: 20 miles
Rating: 5 difficulty, 8 beauty
Park info: Henry Coe State Park east of Morgan Hill

Peter owes a writeup! -- Pictures by Adam, Crystal, David A, George, Hong, Jim, Milon, Qi, Shuli, Sophie, and Peter

A beautiful sunrise greeted us at Coe!

Be careful -- there are a lot of shadowy people around here

Enthusiastic group ready to get going

And they're off! It would be a long time before I'd see the blue ropes again.

Frog Lake was looking good after the recent rains

The dreaded climb up to The Bench never gets easier

Nice view of Mt. Hamilton from top of the ridge

Looking towards Mt. Sizer ...

... then across the valley to Hat Rock

Just follow easy signs!

There's no way you can take a wrong turn! Good thing there were ribbons along the trail for those of us who don't use GPS.

The ladies showing how it's done

Some folks took me too literally when I wrote "get there any way you can", and took the road from Sizer to Hat Rock. For shame!

Newbies decided to climb The Rock ...

... while old-timers just looked for a place to sit.

Crystal didn't want to come down!

Now just follow more easy signs back to HQ

Jim fighting his way through the burnt brush on Rock House Ridge

Jim and Shuli saw real cowboys rounding up a pair of tranquilized bulls. They used three dogs to harry one of them back toward the truck. Note the actual lariat being wielded by the guy on the truck. Yee-haw!

Meanwhile UG and Giulia were literally running to Karri Junction (no wonder they finished hours ahead of me).

Good to see a little water in the creeks. I walked along the Narrows for a bit and then took Shafer Corral Trail up to the main road for a change.

Oh, deer!

We must be nuts!

I felt like this dead tree after hauling myself out of Poverty Flat ... 18 miles down, 2 to go.

Big Henry (literally) threw down one last challenge -- getting around this fallen tree on the Forest Trail

Adam got stabbed in the foot by chaparral -- right through the sole!

Milestones:
Kathryn's 280^th leaf
Peter's 610^th leaf