About 3 hours north of San Francisco, Mendocino offers spectacular coastline views, lush, green, redwood forests and abundance of flowers.If you enjoy serpentine roads, you'll have a kick driving fast on highway 128. Looking for a short getaway from the city? Here is a quick and dirty to finding your way to Mendocino and a few pretty, and gentle hikes.
1st Night: Camp at Hendy Woods (about 3 hours from Golden Gate Bridge). Camp site fee $20 +$6.00 for each additional vehicle: http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=438.
2nd Day: Wake up time: 6:30 AM and head for your 1st hike - roughly a 20 min drive to Van Damme State Park:http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=433
Van Damme State Park: Head for the Fern Canyon Scenic Trail. The trail is paved for the first 1.7 Miles (this doesn't take away from the beautiful redwood trees and soothing sound of the creek, to the right).
The trail is gentle and flat for the most part(with a very short and gentle 15 min? uphill). The highlight is Pygmy Forest. Take the Old Logging Road Trail to the Pygmy Forest and Fern Canyon Trail back. Total Distance about 6 Miles.
Have a quick lunch in Mendocino and head for the 2nd hike to the Southside Trail in the Big River Park. This trail is not maintained (the trailhead is not marked), which makes it that more exciting and fun. It's a short 2 hr (about 3Miles)hike that is covered in flowers (wild irises were particularly beautiful) and variety of vegetation, otherwise not present on well maintained trails.
3rd hike and probably my favorite was at the Russian Gulch State Park, the attraction of this hike was the waterfall. All in all the hike is about 6 Miles long, not difficult at all and mostly flat: http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=432
End your day by catching the Sunset at the Mendocino Headlands State Park (http://www.mcn.org/1/mendoparks/mndhdld.htm).
Grab a bite at Mendocino and head back home!
