Trail San Francisco: I ran a few hundred meters above the Pacific Ocean

In January this year, I have finally fulfilled my long-cherished dream to run in San Francisco - the most favorite city in the world for both asphalt runners and for treylovikov. And I, fortunately, managed to try San Francisco on both sides of the Golden Gate Bridge.

As now trail running fascinates me much more than running on asphalt, talk first about it. The chip of San Francisco lies in the fact that from the center to hundreds of kilometers of some of the best trails in the world, only 15-20 minutes by car. You move across the bridge Golden Gate and find yourself in a national recreation area (Golden Gate National Recreation Area), where diverge several pathways, including, for example, California Coastal Trail length under 2000 km. There are plenty to choose from. :)

Obviously, the time for all 2000 km was not, so we had to limit ourselves to just over 1%. Route I made and uploaded to your Garmin Fēnix 3 advance (in general, upload the route to the GPS-clock or telephone before jogging unknown trail - a good practice). According to the plan was a circle of 24 km and 1 km set in an easy pace with stops for photos. Unfortunately, the weather was far from ideal for landscape photography: overcast, fog, rain at times, but for a run is just what you need.

From the bridge, through the rain and fog we climbed the ridge from which on a clear day offers a wonderful view of the city of Sausalito and Richardson Bay. We enjoyed the views from the town of Silent Hill.

After that, we turned and began a long descent into the valley of Tennessee, which goes directly to the ocean. But in front of the beach decided to make a small circle, he ran to a nearby hill, which offers an incredible view in any weather. Despite this, at first I thought to see something other than rocks and shrubs within 10 meters we were not meant to be.

But after a few minutes the trail went to the break, and at the bottom, 150 meters away from us, began to emerge from the fog Pacific Ocean.

The lower we descended, the less the fog and even more spectacular views become. I can not even imagine how beautiful here on a clear day, when seen in a couple of hundred meters, and for kilometers around.

It is impossible to convey the feeling when you're running on the edge of the cliff a few hundred meters above the raging ocean and do not know where to look - at his feet, or around. I took a little video to try to pass on at least a fraction of it.

The descent brought us to the Tennessee beach. The inscription on the plate was there stated that the passage to where we had just descended, is prohibited. But who knew? :) To get to the beach, we had to ford a small stream, the water temperature which has been 5-6 degrees - a little warmer than the ocean.

After trying vodichku, we started to climb from the beach, by the very steep hill, which was waiting for us on that day, for the distance of 800 meters we climbed almost 200 meters, the average slope will receive 25%. To understand what it is, you can imagine the lift on the 60th floor of the stairs.

Well, after that it was quite boring, because it's time to go back on a wide trail and the road to the launch site. But here in front of us in the fog reappeared majestic Golden Gate Bridge.

If you're curious, you can see the track runs in Strava. And if you are in San Francisco, be sure to take a trip to run or just walk to the other side of the bridge, especially if you are lucky with the weather a little more than me.