Mission Peak (from Stanford Ave) 2015-07-14

Hike #50! 

I wanted this to be a special one. Apollo and I went to scale Mission Peak for the third time, starting from the Stanford Ave staging area. We followed a different route from the ones we did during our first hike in the winter and the second one in the spring. Today was a cool, cloudy summer day and the late start didn't make the hike any more difficult. To boot, I found parking in the Stanford Ave staging area at 8:45 am, a first for me! 

A short while into the hike, we took the fork on the right, Peak Meadow Trail. The dirt trail, a wide fire road, steadily winds up the mountains. At trail post #18, we took Horse Heaven Trail, a narrow dirt trail. We had a couple of close encounters with cattle grazing by this trail. At one point, a cow was standing right in our way and I had to wait for it to move on, while holding an excited Apollo on a tight leash.

If the first two miles involved steady climbing of about 1100 feet, the next mile and a quarter by Horse Heaven Trail turned up the heat by making us climb 1000 feet. The only reward is that this is the road less traveled and the approach to the peak from trail post #19 on the eastern side is a tad gentler. The views of the bay and the mountains are definitely outstanding. 

Mission Peak is visible on the left from this route and for most of the way, the peak was covered with clouds and fog. Fortunately for us, just as we scaled the peak, the fog had burned off, making it picture perfect! 

Some 80+ minutes and 3+ miles into the hike, we were again up on Mission Peak. This was the third time with Apollo. While there were people, today had the least amount of crowd at the top. That meant Apollo could get his own photograph with the Mission Peak post!

From here, we returned by the popular route, taking Ohlone Wilderness Trail (aka Hidden Valley Trail) to the parking lot. Apollo was off-leash most of the way up, and we came across just two hikers making their way down. On our way back he had to go on leash because of the trail traffic. 

Our hike was a nice counter-clockwise loop, following Peak Meadow Trail -> Horse Heaven Trail -> Peak Trail -> Ohlone Wilderness Trail from the Stanford Ave staging area. The 6.8 mile, 2100+ feet climb took us about 2.5 hours and was a memorable 50th hike.

More pictures from the hike today.
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