The Great Outdoors: El Corte Madera Creek Open Space Preserve
First off, let's clarify the name. It may be El Corte Madera Creek Open Space Preserve (ECM) on the maps, but in the hearts and minds of locals, it's known as Skeggs, which is short for Skeggs Point, a prominent vista point and staging point on Skyline Drive (Highway 35) overlooking the Bay side of the peninsula.
Around the Bay Area, especially with mountain bikers, the name Skeggs is spoken in the hushed, reverent tones usually reserved for a place of worship, which is fitting, because Skeggs is a church of nature that provides sanctuary and solace from the ever-encroaching anxiety of the modern world.
Established in 1988, ECM is a labyrinth of old logging, motorcycle, hiking, and game trails that cover 2,821 acres of the western slope of the peninsula's coastal range. Positioned along scenic Skyline Drive midway between Highway 84 to the south and Highway 92 to the north, the preserve features 36 miles of multiuse trails that wend their way down the Pacific side of the coastal range from the Skyline cordillera to the foothills of the coastal plain.
The ECM stretches back nearly 180 years into the history of San Mateo County. Originally part of the Rancho el Corte de Madera dating back to the 1830s, the El Corte Madera Creek watershed was heavily logged from the 1860s to the 1980s by local companies such as Big Creek Lumber. Even so, there are still some stands of old-growth Redwood presiding majestically over their ancestral habitat. In October 1953, a wayward DC-6 airliner met its ultimate demise on the rugged slopes of Corte Madera Canyon, killing all 19 people aboard. The preserve's Resolution Trail was named for and dedicated to the victims. In the early 1970s, it was a motorcycle park. Mountain bikers showed up in 1986.
The Tafoni Sandstone is pretty trippy, even before the mushrooms kick in.
Within its boundaries, Skeggs encompasses some stunning ecological zones, from Redwood rain forest to coastal scrub to rocky sandstone, which can make it a challenge to prep for a Skeggs outing. Because the cordillera often catches the low coastal fog as it makes its way inland, the trails can be wet and muddy, and the trees dripping with condensation, even in the driest of months. Conversely, on days when the coast is completely socked in with fog and the sun is just a distant memory, Skeggs often sits above the fog band in brilliant sunlight. We've also been to Skeggs when there was snow on the ground and when it was 90 degrees, so . . . .
Whatever the time of year, and whatever the weather conditions where you live, Skeggs is sure to surprise and delight. As with most coastal areas, the best time of the year to visit is in the fall. Cyclists and equestrians should refrain from riding Skeggs during the wet winter months to avoid damaging the fragile trails.
Skeggs is a recreational nexus, a place where hikers, bikers, and even equestrians cross paths in pursuit of recreation. Offering not only its own extensive trail network, Skeggs also serves as a central hub connecting several other local open space sites and regional trail systems, including Long Ridge OSP to the south, Purissima Creek OSP to north, and Wunderlich Park and Huddart Park to the east. The hiking-only Wunderlich Trail and Bay Area Ridge Trail also pass through the ECM boundaries, and there is talk of developing a trail easement to connect Skeggs with the town of Woodside.
For hikers and cyclists, Skeggs is a challenge and a pleasure, with something for everybody from the casual walker to the hardcore MTB downhiller. Its steep, winding singletrack and staircased fire roads plunge deep into the Redwood canopy, exploring gurgling canyon streams and a world of banana slugs, giant salamanders, huge ferns, and blissful, penetrating solitude.
Make no mistake, the defining characteristic of the Skeggs trail network is topography -- you will be climbing, and it will be steep. It's calories well spent though.
In fact, the Skeggs trail network is like a kaleidoscope, offering a seemingly endless choice of routes that converge and diverge in multitudes of trailheads and connectors. Half the fun of a Skeggs outing is piecing together a route from the dozens of trails available. Trail signage is extensive, accurate, and visible, but be sure to bring a topo map with you because the trail signs don't give the kind of topographical information that is key to navigating Skeggs. Without a topo map of the park, you might find yourself down at the bottom of the Virginia Mill Trail before you even realize that you've descended 1,000 feet, looking at a long, tough haul back up to the parking lot; or you may find yourself caught in infinite loops of canopied trails searching for the one that will lead you back to your car.
There are many access points to Skeggs from Skyline, Tunitas Creek Road, Bear Gulch Road, and Swett Road. These gated access points are labeled with numbers like CM10 and PC03 (CM refers to Corte Madera and PC refers to Purissima Creek), which offer helpful points of reference when laying out a route or coordinating a meeting spot.
The Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District (MROSD) manages and maintains ECM, and it does a fantastic job. The trails are always in exquisite shape. Some trails are periodically closed by weather, but the MROSD does an excellent job of rehabilitating the trails. It helps to have a plan. Currently, several trails are closed due to weather damage, and this winter, the Giant Salamander Trail is closed for rejuvenation.
Unlike the contentious relationship between peds and bikers in Marin, and even down in Woodside, Skeggs seems to offer a place where the footed, the hooved, and the wheeled can harmoniously co-exist. Occasionally there are reports of park rangers lurking in the shadows with radar guns giving tickets to bikers that exceed the posted 15 mph speed limit, but by and large, bikers move at their own speed without any problems with hikers, horsies, or Johnny Law. Maybe it's something about the grandeur and spectacle of the trees, the smells, or the solitude, but Skeggs has a pacifying element to it that seems to diffuse traditional tensions.
No fee is required to use the Skeggs trails. The park is open from sunrise to half an hour past sunset. There is no camping in the park and no overnight stays in the parking areas. Unfortunately, the MROSD does not allow dogs in the ECM preserve -- 600-pound crapping and pissing horses yes, but hounds no.
As a side note, the voters of San Mateo County rejected ballot Measure A on Tuesday. Measure A would have created a revenue flow of dedicated funds for San Mateo County and its incorporated cities to use exclusively for recreational expenditures. As part of this measure, recreational districts like the MROSD would also have received a cut. In fact, through Measure A, the MROSD stood to get a 4.21 percent slice of what the county was projecting to be $16 million a year in new recreation funding.
For those ostriches out there who want lower taxes at all costs but still expect municipal benefits, get off your hypocritical high-horses and visit Skeggs this weekend to see the good that can come from tax dollars well spent.