The Aptos Rancho Trail is a nice detour from the main fire road trail as you go through the main artery of the park. The Forest of Nisene Marks State Park, located Aptos, CA is a beautiful state park surrounded by redwood forest. It is a local favorite to many hikers, mountain bikers, runners/walkers and horseback riders.
After the heavy rains that drenched Northern California this past week, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to check out the water flow in the Aptos Creek. The creek, which snakes its way through the whole park, starts way up in the Santa Cruz mountains. There are many creeks that flow through the park, but the Aptos Creek is the main waterway that flows all the way to the ocean and it is most visible as you enter the front of the park and can continue to be seen for several miles along the Aptos Creek Fire Road. After 5 years of perpetual drought, it was refreshing to finally get some steady rain to fill up the reservoirs and local watersheds.
The Aptos Rancho Trail is a short, scenic trail and relatively flat. It is approximately 2 miles long and it starts from the parking lot at the park entrance/ranger station and pops out at George's Picnic Area. The trail is not a loop, its an out and back, but if you did want a loop, you can walk the Aptos Creek Fire Road back to the parking lot. The Aptos Rancho Trail runs parallel to the fire road, but at a lower elevation and it allows for a much better, up-close view of the creek. The trail also walks you through a couple of redwood forest groves that are quite beautiful and peaceful because of the way the sunlight filters through the trees and branches and hits the forest floor. Standing in these groves is where you can really get a feel for how tall and massive the redwood trees really are. Adjacent to George's Picnic Area is a steel bridge that crosses the creek and provides an excellent view of it in both directions.
Below are a couple of pictures of the flowing creek and forest groves, along with 2 short videos.
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| Aptos Creek - facing west from the steel bridge (George's Picnic Area) |
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| Aptos Creek - facing east from the steel bridge (George's Picnic Area) |
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| Redwood forest grove with sunlight trickling through the trees |
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| Those are some TALL trees |
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| This is funny - there is still a payphone available in the park |
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