Re: California State Parks Thank you for your information. I am just considering to back up to my young days. Since I am not paying California tax, I may not be a priority user for those facilities. It will be too bad to shut down reasonable cost facilities in State Parks. I hear even some National Parks will be closed soon: Big Basin or Muir Woods and Mount Tam will be closed soon? Hopefully after my visit. Although I do not like long tough mountain climbing, I do hiking or trekking in Kamakura hills. Wonder if you can recommend 2 to 3 hour hiking route in California or Grand Canyon area. I also wondering if snake, particularly rattle snake, is in those easy hiking area.
Crystal Cove Cottages and hiking ｔrails Looking here, it looks like Crystal Cove Cottages are pretty popular. http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=ja&geocode=&q=crystal+cove+cottages+ca&vps=1&jsv=163d&sll=37.370157,-95.712891&sspn=29.666549,56.25&ie=UTF8&latlng=33555572,-117818745,1381390163728984769&ei=Mw88Svy-HoOujQOjhsTMAw&cd=1 so, now I understand why it is in the list of "open units", as "funded by self generated revenues". That means it will be pretty hard to make reservation there. We go hike in local Santa Monica Mountains quite often about 15 minutes away from our home near Marina del Rey. Our favorite trail is Los Liones trail: http://www.redtrails.com/id/Z2866L4/base.asp after 20 minutes or so, we get a great view of Pacific Ocean. We also like Temescal Canyon, but it is sukoshi more challenging, and exponsed to sun longer... http://www.localhikes.com/Hikes/TemescalCanyon_4472.asp Yes, there are a lot of rattle snakes on these trails, so you have to be careful not step on them sleeping on the trail. We recommend wear hiking boots, not sandals. One of our friend almost stepped on one, but he was lucky. They (LA Times?) said that there ia one single puma (mountain lion) still living in Santa Monica Mountains. We have not seen him (her?), off course, but there ia a sign to stay on the trail because of him (her?). In Bay Area, yes, Muir Woods, Big Basin are nice, but we like Mt Diablo as well, but we haven't done it in years. At Grand Canyon, we ususally walks around the South Rim, not done down too far down into the canyon. We have a friend who has gone down, but he didn't like it too much, but we would like to try that some days. But we haven't gone there for awhile either. We just came back from Japan and we went up to Nagano, and had a one day hiking in Togakushi area (奥社 鏡湖 中社）, and we had a great time.
a lot of rattle snakes!!!...! Thanks for your additional comments and suggestions. This will be very helpful for my future travel. Rattle snakes might be shot with a gun in my memory of western movies. でも蛇は嫌いなのです。 ちかくの横浜の金沢のトレイルには「マムシいる」とサインボードがあるので、夏は歩かないようにしています。でもたぶんうそです。遊歩道から茂みに人がはいらないように書いてあるだけだと思います。 関係ない話ですが、松坂君また打たれています。どーしたのでしょう？ けんしんはヒット１本に押さえています。
