East Molera Trail Big Sur 2023-02-25

Maggie came to visit my apartment in Santa Clara for a week in February, right in the middle of the massive rain storms that California keep being hit with this past spring. I’ve been excited to show her all of the natural beauty I’ve found here, but the rains didn’t bode well for outdoor trips. Thankfully, the day after she arrived, there was a break in the clouds for an afternoon. We jumped on the opportunity and drove down to Big Sur.

All of the National Forest was closed due to the flooding from the storms, but we did some digging and found that the Andrew Molera State park was still open for hiking. After two hours in the car, we parked in a little pull off on the side of Route 1. The trailhead was hidden behind a large road sign and didn’t seem to be much more than a footpath leading off the side of the road up a hill. It didn’t inspire much confidence that we had found the right spot, but a trail sign a little ways up confirmed that we were on the right path. The trail begins as a four-wheeler road completely covered in trees, but in time turned into a single footpath winding its way through bushes up the side of the hill.

As we climbed higher and higher, the foliage diminished and the views grew. The sights began as the inside of the forest canopy, and morphed into a small valley, and the valley turned into Foothills surrounding the valley, and then the Foothills surrounding the valley turned into the seaside landscape. The sliver of ocean we could initially see grew and grew into a panoramic vista. The bushes gave way to short grass and abundant flowers in yellows and oranges and purples. As we climbed higher and higher hillside rounded over. Soon we were following a ridge up towards the Ventana wilderness.

As we got higher up we could see further out to the east as well. The mountains dissolved into the horizon with snowy caps dotting the closest ones to us. The sun was still in the sky, but there was a bit of a cold wind blowing through- we kept moving and it wasn’t too bad. As we hiked Maggie told me the story of her becoming a master archer as a child.

The park officially closed at sunset, but we decided to fudge that a little bit. We reached the summit and sat there for a while watching the sun inch closer to the horizon. Maggie offered to give me a fake black eye so that if anyone asked about our tardiness, we could pretend that I had fallen. We sat on a rock at the top and I pulled out some cashews and two apples to celebrate our successful journey. As the sun went down, the winds picked up and we really started to feel the cold- I borrowed Maggie’s flannel and she borrowed my jacket.

We started walking down right is the sun kissed the horizon. What was dazzling before became lit up with a golden light that seemed to saturate all of the colors three times over. The clouds turned golden-orange, the sky turned purple and the hills were bathed in an emerald green.