Leona Canyon 7-13-14

Leona Trail

Sunday afternoon seemed like a good time to go out for a little hike. I thought that it would be nice to try someplace new, at least new to me, but I didn't want to drive far, so I came up with Leona Canyon. Leona Canyon Regional Open Space Preserve is a relatively small park tucked into the hills of East Oakland between 580 and Skyline Blvd., just south of the Merritt College campus. I left Darby at home to avoid any problems with off-leash dogs. I usually don't take him out on trails on weekends, and I had heard that this park was popular with dog walkers.

The map showed a trailhead just off Keller Ave., so I drove up that street looking for it. I went all the way from 580 up to Skyline without seeing any sign of a trailhead. After a closer inspection of the map, I saw that it is just off Campus Drive on Canyon Oaks Drive. It looks like it is just a parking lot for a group of condominiums, but beyond that is parking for the trail. I started up the Leona Trail, gently climbing on a shady trail beside a small creek. There was still a trickle of water, which was nice since so many east bay creeks are bone dry in this drought year. I had looked at the map for possibilities for making a loop, but the only ones I came up with involved a lot of walking on city streets, so I just continued on up the canyon past two trails branching left and right. At the top, I found myself in one of the back parking lots of Merritt College, and I turned around and headed back down. I had seen on the map that the two side trails looked pretty steep, but I wanted to check one of them out anyway. I started off up the Artemesia Trail, and as I expected it was quite steep and getting steeper. I soon decided that it wasn't worth the work just to satisfy my curiosity, and turned around. So Leona Canyon was a nice little hike, but nothing too special. A good place for a walk for people who live nearby, but probably not a place that I'll keep coming back to.

Back at the car, I wanted to drive up to Skyline and take another look at the Oakland City Stables that I had hiked through several months ago. I found the entrance road with a gate across it and a "no parking" sign, so I gave up on that idea. I was hoping to take some pictures of the old spanish-style building that I had seen before. Just this morning, I read in the paper that the city had made a deal with a group that was going to fix up and re-open the facility. That sounds like good news and maybe I'll go by and take another look at it some day.

3.1 miles, 500 ft. climb