Tag: explore more

Chico and Oroville Area Hikes

Keelie Cox

As a Northern California native and an avid hiker, I like to get out and explore. Most of these hikes are available year-round and are a great way to get outside and explore your surrounding area.

Table Mountain

Table Mountain is a great place to take the family and let your dogs run loose. It is located in Oroville, CA near Oregon City just off of Cherokee Rd (Google Maps provides excellent directions). In the springtime, you can find the field blooming with wildflowers and the waterfall roaring at its peak. There is a creek that runs through a vast canyon which makes this a site to see year round. There are various trails you can take and make this hike as short or as long as you want. Just a forewarning, this area can get very wet and very muddy so be prepared. To locate the waterfall just follow the creek from the parking lot. The pasture is also home to some free grazing cattle. Located just 40 mins from Chico, North Table Mountain Ecological Preserve is one trail not to miss.

Side note: Waterfall not pictured so not to ruin the surprise. For best water flow visit in Spring.

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Puppies and Wild Flowers

Paradise Flumes

The Flumes are great in the summer because of the numerous swimming holes located along the Feather River. However, just hiking along the Flumes and soaking in the beautiful scenery is a treat in itself and can be experienced year round. You can access the Flumes from a few different locations. The two most popular starting locations are Feather River Hospital and Dean Road. After turning into the hospital, you can follow the road to the very back where you will find a parking lot and a trail. Dean Road can be found off of Pentz Road in Paradise. Once you turn onto Dean, follow the road until it ends. There you will find another section of the Flumes Trail (again google maps provides excellent directions). Dean Road may be a better option for dog owners. If you chose to walk on the actual flume (which I recommend) your dog might not appreciate it because it’s like walking on a railroad track. Paradise Flumes is located just 30 minutes from Chico and is a local favorite not to be missed. Take one of the many deer trails down to the river and find your perfect swimming hole. Whether you are looking to sunbathe or cliff jump, this trail is perfect for everyone.

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Hiking along the Flumes

Upper Bidwell

If you are looking to get outside but don’t want to stray too far from home Upper Bidwell is the ultimate classic. The park is accessible year round to bikers, joggers, hikers, and dog owners. During the summer, Upper Park offers excellent swimming holes for everyone to enjoy. The north side of the park is the “off leash” area for dogs while the south side (where the water is) asks you keep your dog on a leash. The north side is out in the open and without shade so it can get very warm in the summer. There are quite a few different trails to explore, but one of the more popular trails is Monkey Face. It is a short but steep hike up that offers panoramic views of the valley. The entrance to the park is located on the corner of East Ave and Manzanita Ave in Chico, CA. From there you can follow the road until you see a large parking lot on the left. There is a gate there that closes the road to any further traffic, so some days you are forced to park in that lot, but on days that the gate is open you can follow the dirt road up to popular swimming holes like Bear Hole. Upper Bidwell is located in the city and is very popular with the locals. Don’t be surprised if you show up on an April afternoon and find the parking lot full.

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Big Chico Creek

Feather Falls

Feather Falls might be the best hike on this list. It’s also the most traditional. The others offered multiple trails and the freedom to make your hike as long or short as you want. Feather Falls is a loop, and the magnificent waterfall (located about 1/2 way) is the highlight. My recommendation is to do this hike in the spring. The waterfall is at its peak and the heat isn’t so treacherous. I have completed this hike in July before and it was a little too hot for my liking. Maybe a mile after you start the hike, you will reach a trail split. This starts the loop. I usually take the trail to the right first. It is longer, but the inclines and declines are more gradual and easier on my knees. Once you reach the tip of the loop, you will see the turn off for Feather Falls. You climb for about a mile before reaching the overlook. The overlook is out above the canyon and the river giving you the perfect view of the falls, but there is no shade. After making the climb back down, you can continue on the loop. This section is shorter, but it is a steep incline. The hikers I meet going the opposite way aren’t a fan of the continuous downhill. That much downhill hurts my knees which is why I choose to climb it, but it is totally a personal preference. This is a popular hike, so I usually try to get there early. The trailhead is about an hour from Chico. To get there you take Hwy 162 E in Oroville and drive past Gold Country Casino. You turn right on Forbestown Rd which will eventually turn into Lumpkin Road. You will periodically see signs for Feather Falls to reassure you that you are going in the right direction. From Lumpkin, you will turn left onto Bryant Ravine Rd which will take you to the trailhead parking lot. The trail is about 8 miles long and is in a remote area, so pack whatever you might need for the day. Dogs are welcome. This is probably one of my favorite hikes in the area that I continue to do year after year. Again, I don’t want to ruin the surprise of the falls, so I chose not to include a picture.

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The trail to the falls was flooded

I wanted to keep this post local, so I chose some of my favorite hikes that are at most an hour drive away one way. I am always looking for new places to hike and explore, so if you have a favorite place you’d like to share feel free to leave a comment!

San Antonio

Keelie Cox

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I had a few long yet successful days in Corpus Christi celebrating my sister getting her Naval Wings, and now it was time to move on to San Antonio. Rather than giving a detailed reenactment of my time there, I thought I would share the places I visited, what I liked, and what I wasn’t a fan of.

The weather

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It was early July, and it was hot and humid. We spent most of our first day walking around the Downtown and Riverwalk area while we waited for hotel check in. We eventually retreated to the mall to escape the heat. Air conditioning is a must down there, pools are a plus, bring lots of water, and don’t worry…everyone has the same sweat marks you do.

Our hotel

We stayed at the Red Roof Inn. It had a pool, which we didn’t end up using, but the thought of it was nice. The A/C worked great, and the location was pretty good. The hotel was located just outside of downtown so you could walk everywhere. The room was nice, but I was not a fan of the check in process and the bathroom. Since we booked last minute, I’m assuming that is why we given the room with the handicap bathroom. I don’t have an issue with that, but the bathroom was gross. We wore our sandals in the bathroom and shower because the floor looked dirty. There was a sink but no counter. The bathroom needs a remodel. I stayed in a roll in handicap bathroom in New York, and it was clean and chic. The one at the Red Roof Inn needs a makeover. Check in was awful because it was painfully long. And after over 20 minutes of what felt like torture, they put us in the wrong room. If I were to stay in San Antonio again I would look to stay somewhere else first.

Downtown and the River Walk

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Both were great. The highlight of downtown I would say is the Alamo. It’s an amazing historic site which I was surprised was free to enter. They have a lot of tourist things like Ripley’s Believe it or Not, souvenir shops, pubs, and the mall in their downtown area. The mall is huge. The Riverwalk is something different entirely. It is below the city, and I think about 10 degrees cooler. It’s filled mostly with restaurants, pubs, night clubs, and some shops, but it is still a site to see. The river you can tell is man made. It is funneled off of the main river into this large canal that runs right down the middle of everything. The landscaping is done well, and it is a very popular place. Very busy. I definitely recommend it for lunch, dinner, and a night out on the town. At night, the streets are lined with glowing carriages like from Cinderella that you can hire to take you around.

The Pearl

This is another “area” of San Antonio just outside of downtown. It is less crowded and to me had a more hipster vibe. More cafes, and boutique kind of shops. There is also a large brewery there, but I did not get to see it. We showed up on Sunday, and a lot of the places were closed. I couldn’t really tell if the Pearl had much of a nightlife, but it definitely looked like a place you could spend the day, have lunch and get out of the downtown area. We visited a macaroon shop there and all the flavors were delicious.

The Safari Park and Six Flags

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San Antonio reminded me of Southern California in a sense of all their amusement parks. You have Schlitterbahn, Six Flags, Sea World, Aquatica to name a few. They also have a Safari Park. Most of these parks are a little bit out of town and are accessed best by car. While I was there I visited the Safari Park and Six Flags. Both were great. I went on a safari in Africa about 6 months ago, so I found it a little funny to be seeing the same animals planted here in States. The difference though is you could feed them and pet them. Just don’t get out of your car. The animals at the park include goats, deer, a variety of antelope, buffalo, longhorns, zebras, and ostrich just to name a few. It was really a fun experience, if you have a car to get there I highly recommend it. I also spent a day at six flags. Again, the weather was boiling, so the water rides were heaven. It wasn’t too crowded when we were there, and there is a water park attached to it. So with the price of one ticket, you get access to both parks. I also recommend Six Flags if you ever find yourself in San Antonio.

Last but not least….the food!

I definitely had to detox myself when I returned to the west coast after a week in Texas. I wanted to enjoy all the good Texas food and then some. After getting off the airplane, I went to a Cracker Barrel. I had Chic-Fil-A for dinner that night, and again for lunch the next morning. (The only two times I’ve ever had Chick-Fli-A in my life, we don’t have one where I live). I ate at Whataburger and consumed a lot of Mexican food and BBQ. My taste buds were surely satisfied. I drank a Big Red soda and tried out some local Texas beer. The beer was okay, they can leave the craft brew to the west coast. At one bar we asked for something local and they suggested Lagunitas. I grew up in California, so I stood there scratching my head for a bit trying to figure out how that was local. One of my best food finds was J  & I cafe. It’s a small hole in the wall on the other side of downtown. I was a bit weary walking to it from my hotel in the morning. It’s a Mexican restaurant that serves the most bomb breakfast tacos and horchata. It was super cheap too. I had never had a breakfast taco before then, and I might be ruined for them now because it was delicious. I definitely ate my way through Texas, so it’s probably a good thing I walked so much in the heat because I sweated everything out.

Bottom line

Go to San Antonio. I did not make it to Austin (before you slap me, I ran out of time!) But I know it’s about an hour from San Antonio, so you can easily take a drive down, or even a mega bus, and check out San Antonio. It’s a city full of a lot of history, activities, and some really neat niche areas to check out. I will make it to Austin soon, and if I have time I’ll for sure swing back down to SA and get myself another breakfast taco.

 

The Amazon and Back Again

Keelie Cox

As I sit on this extra-long plane ride home from Dallas, (thanks Air Force One) I have decided to finally finish writing about my trip to Peru. I left off returning home from Machu Picchu tired and excited. I had a free day before I had to go back to school and then that night I would take the bus to Puerto Maldonado (Peruvian Amazon). I did most of my packing before school, but it didn’t even dawn on me that I was supposed to check out of my room and remove my belongings since I wouldn’t be sleeping there. I ended up having to pay for the extra night, but luckily it wasn’t expensive. My silly mistake. I grabbed my bags and took a cab to the bus stop. The bus we were on was pretty fancy in my opinion, and I had a killer seat. I sat on the top level, right up front. It was a single seat with no one behind me. The closest people were across the aisle. They had free movies, and I was getting into my book. It was an overnight bus, meaning I left at 9pm and was arriving at 7am, so I knew sleep was crucial. In between cat naps I would look out the window and watch the rain fall and the scenery change. I was going from 11,000 feet high in the Andes to Sea Level in the jungle. I could see the condensation on the bus windows and feel the humidity. I finally dozed off for quite some time only to be awoken by the bus making a sudden stop and people getting on board. It was the Peruvian Military, and when they came on I could vaguely understand they were asking for passports. I handed the man my passport, he looked at it, looked at me and then returned it. He did the same to my neighbors across the aisle and then asked me for mine again. I assumed he was looking for my visa slip which I kept in a different location so it didn’t slip out of my passport. Everywhere and everyone in Peru wants to see your passport. I handed it to him a second time, he checked everything out and then returned it back to me. He left the bus with some of the local’s id cards and returned later to hand them back. I guess he was cross checking their names on some database. I found out later that he also took some passports from the lower level off the bus and returned them later. I think I would have been nervous had a scary looking foreign military man that I cannot communicate with took my passport out of my sight. Everything ended up okay. I guess they do random stops to make sure no one on the bus had been reported missing or is on a known list. Safety precautions. I arrived in Puerto Maldonado and boy was it humid. I hadn’t felt that type of humidity in a long time. Luckily I showed up during a “storm” (it was overcast), so I wasn’t getting all the heat. I found the man with the sign waiting for my group and he took us to our destination. We were to hang out at the headquarters of our lodge while we waited for everyone else to arrive before we could take the boat to our lodge. I was definitely tired and ready for a shower. We got a home cooked breakfast from the neighbors who were originally from Morro Bay, California. It was delicious. The boat ride down the Made de Dios River and it was was long. It felt like forever before we reached Planet Amazon. I liked the lodge. I got my own private bungalow (because I was travelling solo), and we had all our meals cooked for us. I was there for two nights and everything was led by a guide.  I thought the main lodge area might have wifi but it did not. I was okay with the idea of being separated from the online world for a while, but I had told a few people I would take to them that night, so I was hoping they wouldn’t worry. We went on guided walks looking at the flora and fauna and keeping an eye out for wild life. We visited a wildlife sanctuary, went Cayman spotting and on a night nature walk. We climbed a tree bridge that gave us an incredible view from the tree top. Since it was overcast the whole time I was there the weather was perfect and I didn’t have a problem with bugs. I had some pretty awesome people in my group, and luckily a few of them were taking the same night bus as I back to Cusco. Because of flights, we had to take the boat back to the main town quite early. Puerto Maldonado is not as big of a tourist town as Cusco, so it was nice getting a different view of Peru. I slept like a baby on the bus ride back, and this time no cops came aboard. The only bummer was we got back at 7am and you can’t check in until after 12, so we dropped off our bags, grabbed some breakfast and explored more around Cusco. This was it for me. I was going home the next morning. I bought any last minute trinkets and headed back to my room. I took a much needed shower and nap. Even though I slept on the bus, there is nothing like sleeping on a non-moving bed. I grabbed one last meal and hung out at the bar in my hostel one last time. I had an excellent time in Cusco. I was a little sad I wasn’t getting to explore more of Peru or South America, but I had been travelling for a long time and was ready to go home.

 

Exploring around Cusco

Keelie Cox

I had a half day Friday. I left about an hour before my tour, so I had time to grab lunch and visit the ATM. It took me an hour to get home, traffic was horrendous, so I quickly changed and skipped the ATM and lunch. The tour guide was a 1/2 late picking me up so I would have had plenty of time to do the things I skipped. I used the last of my cash to get inside a church. I can go into detail about the Church and its history, but you can also google it. We got into the bus and made our way to some ruins just outside the city. Turns out I needed a lot of cash to buy a tourist ticket. There was no ATM nearby and no one took a card. I was going to have to sit on the bus for the entire tour when the bus driver decided to loan me some money. It was really kind of him. The ruins were beautiful and the history was kind of sad. The Spanish sort of annihilated the Incas and their traditions. It was a long tour with lots of sites to see, but I was also starving, and I started to get really cold. The tour ended, and I paid the bus driver back, got food and prepared for my quad tour in the am. The next day I left before breakfast, so I packed a few snacks. I was on a tour with all Remote Year people. They were friendly enough, but I was definitely the oddball. I was familiar with the quad. Peru is the 3rd country I have gone on a quad ride in. We road around some beautiful scenery. Saw some more ruins and a salt mine. I got extremely dusty, and we were gone all day. So now I had no breakfast or lunch, only my snacks. Overall it was a good day. After we returned from our adventure, the group of us went out to linner, and I made my way back to my place for a much needed shower. On Sunday I went river rafting. The guide retrieved me from my hostel and took me to the bus. We sat on the bus and drove around Cusco for an hour and then started our journey. When we arrived at the rafting spot, the guide told us we would zip line first. A few people didn’t go because they said it didn’t look safe. I thought it has to be safe because the company doesn’t want that reputation. A few people were hooked up wrong, and it wasn’t properly explained to me how to break. Everyone made it across. A different guide explained to me how to break, so the second zip line was a bit more enjoyable. Even though it was shorter. We then geared up for river rafting. I was in the boat where half spoke English and half spoke Spanish. The sun was hiding behind the clouds, but I had a great time. I sat up front and got extremely wet, but it was a blast. After river rafting, we had a delicious lunch and started the journey home. The journey home was awful. We got stuck in traffic like I had never seen, and I was exhausted. We were supposed to be gone for 6 hours and ended up being gone for over 10. And I think almost half of that was spent on the bus. I needed to do laundry before my trek, but that didn’t happen because we got home too late. I still enjoyed myself, but it had been a really long weekend. I spent my nights socializing in the bar in my hostel. I met some really cool people from all over the world, and my friends won the beer pong tournament. Meeting people is probably my favorite part about traveling. It makes me forget how terrible traffic is, or how exhausted I am.

Peru take 2

Keelie Cox

Alright well that didn’t take as long as I thought. So my flight to Peru was over 24 hours long. And I did not receive a proper nights sleep in almost 3 days. It may have been the most confusing 3 days of my life. We left for SFO at 2 am. My flight was at 6:50 am. I landed in El Salvador 1:40 my time. And then I left El Salvador at 8pm, to arrive in Lima at midnight, to leave for Cusco at 3am and to make it to my final destination at about 5am. Long day. And of course, no one lets you check in early, So I took a seat on a bean bag chair and passed out. I’m sure that was a sight to see. The El Salvador airport was something less to be desired. Hardly any restaurants, shops, and limited wifi. I found a place I could nap. Then when my gate was announced they would let me access it. It was behind a extra screening system. And even when the “be at your gate time” had come and passed they still wouldn’t let me through. They was a group of us and we were all very confused. Turns out the extra screening was for flights going to the US. Since we were headed to Peru, we had to wait until all the US bound people had left, so they could shut down the screening and let us through. No extra bag check. No one could explain this to us. And darn USA and their extra security checks. I arrived in Lima and immigration and customs was a breeze thank goodness! They made me put my bag on a x-ray machine, which I’m thinking now might of been for drugs. The only two countries that have ever x-rayed my bag was Costa Rica and Peru. I’m pretty sure they are looking for drugs. So after arriving in Cusco and taking my nap on a bean bag, I decided to explore around the city. I have been to quite a few places, and have met people from all over the world. I hadn’t really experienced a language barrier until then. Even in Italy most people could understand me or speak English. The language barrier has its perks. When street vendors try to pester me I honestly don’t understand them. Cusco is a city where there is something always going on and the sun shine brights. One of my first purchases was a hat. There was a parade going on in the main plaza, and it was relaxing to soak up some sun and watch the dancers and the musicians. I did retreat to my hostel and take a nap once I was able to check in. The following morning I had a meeting with the “principal” of the school I would be volunteering at. She runs the school, but it isn’t a traditional school like what I am used to in the US. That Monday was a school holiday, so I had another full day to explore the city. I spent a lot of time aimlessly wondering around. I had a map, but I found the city hard to navigate around. I got things ready for my first day of school. I was told the kids usually show up in the afternoon, so in the morning I would probably help in the kitchen and there was an art room. It was definitely going to be a new experience for me.