Articles by Ron Erskine

About Ron Erskine
Ron Erskine is a local outdoors columnist and avid hiker.

Local backcountry

“I have been meaning to get up there.”“It’s been 10 years since I visited the park. I have to go back soon.”When I talk to people in our community, many who have lived here for decades, I am surprised how often I hear remarks like this about Henry W. Coe State Park. [...]
A mountain lion in the brush, via Shutterstock

Movements of Mountain Lions

She was doing everything she tells people not to do: running on a trail alone at dusk. “A mountain lion popped out of the brush right above me, 10 feet away,” says Zara McDonald. “For several minutes, he stared down at me, indifferent to my presence, before slipping away [...]

Rolling countryside

One in eight Americans call California home, making it more and more difficult to find solitude in one of our national parks. In 2017, over four million people visited Yosemite; Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks eclipsed two million visitors for the first time. But a bit [...]

Hidden in the Sierras

The most visited Sierra playgrounds are alongside mountain passes traversed by the main highways that cross the range. Donner Summit, Echo Summit and Carson Pass are examples that come easily to mind. These areas offer special sights to be sure, but often in close company with [...]

Beneath our souls

The Sierra Nevada and the Cascade Range are part of the American Cordillera, a continuous range of mountains that runs along the west side of the New World from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego. [...]

Rancho San Vicente

At the bottom of the Almaden Valley, the hiking trails of Calero County Park crisscross the slopes above the park’s namesake reservoir. If you have recently traveled McKean Road, you may have noticed some construction hubbub a half mile below the reservoir dam. Work at the [...]

Years long passed

The East Bay Regional Parks District boasts 121,397 acres of land preserved in 73 parks, and I have visited no more than a handful of them. In an effort to trim this ignorance, I recently reached out to two East Bay friends. Margaret Campos and Beth Ludwig, two hiking buddies [...]

Pacific Flyway

Prior to the intense settlement that began with the gold rush, California’s Central Valley was an immense wetland. A representative of California’s Department of Water Resources once told me that in wet winters one could nearly row all the way across it to the Sierra [...]

Getting higher

Last September, Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District opened the restored summit of Mount Umunhum, site of the iconic radar tower that has overlooked the Santa Clara Valley since 1957. The five-mile serpentine drive up Mount Umunhum Road will take you to a 3,486-foot perch [...]

Into the crisp air

After a dry December, it looks like some rainy weather may be in store. Hopefully, it won’t be long before the hint of green in the hills grows rich, the creases in the hills gurgle with runoff, and the flowers begin to pop. If you just pulled into town or have never hiked our [...]
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