Jane Merryman

Length of hike: About 10 miles round-trip, out and back (about 4 hours)

Difficulty: Easy to moderate

Best time: Any season of the year, but the cool weather of autumn and spring is most enjoyable

Highlights: Trees, trees, and wind soughing in trees

To get there: Take California Highway 12 from Santa Rosa to the town of Glen Ellen. Turn right on Arnold Drive and right again at London Ranch Road. From the south take Arnold Drive and turn left on London Ranch Road. Go uphill to the park entrance kiosk. Day use fee is $6.00 per vehicle, $5.00 for seniors.

            When I take friends to Jack London State Historic Park for a hike, I have trouble getting them onto a trail—there’s so much here besides the meadows and forests that climb up the east side of Sonoma Mountain.

            In 1960 Beauty Ranch, the home of author Jack London, became a California State Historic Park. Visitors can explore the cottage, now being renovated, where Jack lived and wrote many of his stories. The House of Happy Walls is the museum that Charmian, Jack’s second wife, built after his death. A short walk leads to the ruins of Wolf House, constructed of stone and redwood to last “a thousand generations,” but consumed by flames on a hot August night a month before Jack was to move in. The Wolf House fire was suspicious, and Jack’s death mysterious; both events still engender debate by scholars and aficionados. The drama and romance of his story inevitably draw us in.

            I volunteer as a docent here and we all—docents, rangers, park staff—call London simply “Jack.” To us he seems very much alive, even though since 1916 his body has lain under a red boulder in the woods nearby.  

            Jack lived forty years and accomplished more than most people do in twice that amount of time. Who has not read The Call of the Wild in a high school or junior high English class? This book, published in 1903, catapulted its then unknown writer into the position of America’s most read author of the time. His socialist works, fiction and nonfiction, still have a cultish following in Eastern Europe and bring many pilgrims to the House of Happy Walls every year.

            The museum nicely documents Jack’s life of adventure, and park personnel are on hand every day to answer questions. We can purchase a trail map here, as well as copies of many of Jack’s tales. Charmian was an accomplished pianist and Saturday and Sunday afternoons volunteer musicians fill the rooms with music played on her grand piano. Weekends docents lead hikes and staff the museum and the cottage.

            Our entire visit to the park could be taken up with Jack London, his writings, his ranch, his mystique. But the mountain beckons, and a mild, sunny autumn day or even a blustery winter one is perfect for a good stretch of the legs.

            This park is in the Bay Area Ridge Trail system, a dream project that will eventually encircle San Francisco Bay—400 miles. Only parts of it are now in place, and we can walk some of them here. Look for the blue and white markers. A new section, Sonoma Ridge Trail, still a work in progress that will continue southwesterly toward Petaluma in the future, is our goal today.

            At the entrance kiosk, turn right into the vast asphalt parking area. Following the signs to the lake, we skirt the white farm cottage where Jack lived and two stone barns, perfect candidates for photographic or pen and ink portraits. The road curves past Jack’s innovative “pig palace” and concrete silos and alongside acres of hillside vineyard. A walk here in September impresses upon us the full meaning of the expression “fat of the land”—the lush, heavy vines are almost ready for harvest. At the meeting of vineyard and woods, I have sometimes seen a noisy pileated woodpecker.

            We could stay on the road all the way to the lake, a mile distant, where Jack and his many guests went to swim. But I suggest a small trail off to the right. It winds through a forest studded with redwoods and, in the spring, is a fine place to look for lilies and trilliums. Big-leaf maple, Douglas fir, hazelnut, bay trees, and sword ferns complement the dappled scenery. Poison oak is rife, so we should stay on the trail. The road and the trail converge at the lake, a man-made pond with a lovely stone dam. The rustic bathhouse has been recently restored. Reflections of egrets, herons, coots, and mallards sometimes float on the still, dark water.

            Follow the road past the dam—and here is our last chance to find a rest room. Continue left down into the trails of Sonoma Developmental Center, including an old orchard and the “mystery” tree. Or go right, up toward the top of Sonoma Mountain. The summit is not in the park, but you can get nearly to the top. We aren’t going to go that far today. We’ll hike on Mountain Trail past Quarry, Asbury, and Treadmill to the new Sonoma Ridge Trail. 

            Soon after we climb up from the lake, a wide hairpin turn opens to the left onto a meadow where, on a day swept clean by the wind, we can see south to San Francisco Bay and Mount Diablo. Stand on the wooden bench to get a better view above the coyote bush that is taking over the grassland.

            As we continue upward, Jack’s blue lake sparkles through the feathery foliage of redwood trees. During and just after rain, plump green mosses gird the tree trunks and rocks on the upside of the trail. Look also for the tiny goldback fern with dark red, wiry stems. In dry weather it is folded in on itself with gold dust showing on its underside. In wet weather its fronds are wide open and we may not see the gold. Without picking the fern, bend down a sleeve or a pant leg and press the back of the fern firmly against the cloth. You’ll end up with a delicate fern print.

            Past Treadmill Road the way becomes steeper, but we are almost at the turnoff for Sonoma Ridge. Uphill on the left we soon spot a little kiosk that marks the trailhead. We are now about one hour from the parking lot, two and a half miles. The kiosk informs us that our elevation is 2,100 feet and that the multiuse trail is 3.3 miles one-way. A nearby trail etiquette sign reminds us of courtesy and safety—bikers are supposed to defer to hikers and horses; horses have the right of way over bikers and hikers. The tall, big-leaved plants downslope from here are false aralia (elk clover) mixed with giant chain ferns.

            The trail starts out rocky and rises gradually through the parklike forest, which is a virtual anthology of California’s loveliest trees. Fat yellow-green leaves of the madrone tree contrast with the red-orange of its limbs. On old madrones the lower trunk is dark brown and bumpy. Younger trunks have thin, smooth bark that peels off with a snap-crackle on hot summer days. We also see Kellogg oaks and tanbark oaks as well as coast live oaks and Oregon oaks. Leaves lie thick on the path under a scattering of little “mousetail”cones of Doug fir.

             In the sparse understory, the occasional chartreuse green elderberry shrub lights up the dim woods; native bunch grasses spill down the slopes.  Wine-red trunks of sculptural manzanitas guard the trail. In a few sunny pocket meadows grow wild oats and sprawling buckeye trees, naked from late summer except for their round brown fruit.

            All we hear is the soughing of the wind in the treetops and sometimes a creaking high in the branches. A small stream bubbles cheerily even at the end of summer.

            Fern Lake appears below us in the developmental center grounds, and the traffic on Highway 12 glints in the distance against the mountains between the Valley of the Moon and Napa Valley. To the north is Mount St. Helena in Napa County. We might hear the scream of a red-tail hawk—or is it the imitative Stellar’s jay?

            At the top of the trail we come upon quintessential California landscape: round hills, all gold and grassy, topped with dark green valley oaks backed by dense blue sky—a fine place for lunch. Then we swing around the loop to return the way we came. It’s tempting to take the downhill trail that presents itself at this point, but we must resist. This way is not well marked and we could easily get lost.

            The trail back travels faster than the way up and the views are more expansive. East Bay hills and the northern reaches of the bay simmer in the haze. These vistas are brief, though, since the forest wants to close us in.

            It’s easy to imagine ourselves tramping through these woods nearly 100 years ago. . . . We round a bend and spot a party of bathers splashing in the lake.

            “Hi there. Come join us for a swim,” calls out Jack.