About Castle Rock State Park: Castle Rock State Park emcompasses over 5,200 acres of wildlands in the Santa Cruz Mountains. There are 35 miles of hiking trails, interesting rock formations and fabulous views of the San Lorenzo Valley and Pacific Ocean. Other activities include backpacking, horseback riding and rock climbing. Park hours are from 6:00 a.m. to dusk.
Directions to Trail Head: Take
85 exit to Saratoga. Go through the village of Saratoga and up Highway 9. Take a left at Skyline
Blvd (highway 35). Castle Rock is on your right. Parking alongside
Hwy 35 is free, inside the park you have to pay a $5.00 fee.
Hike Description: We made an approximately 8 mile loop stating at the Saratoga Gap Trail from the main park headquarters. The hike began with a visit to the spectacular 3,214 foot Castle Rock, the parks main attraction, which is located just 3/10 mile from the parking lot. Here you can walk around the rocks and explore the many nooks and crannies of the rocks. From there we continued on another 0.8 miles to Castle Rock Falls which is approximately 80 feet high and fed by the headwaters of Kings Creek. We continued on the Saratoga Gap Trail passing through beautiful chaparral and superb views along the way. After the campsite we connected to the Loghry Woods Trail which connected us to Highway 35 where we crossed into Sanborn Park. We ended the hike with a walk along the Skyline Trail in Sanborn Park which took us back to the Castle Rock Parking lot. The total loop took us about 3 hours.
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The Hikers at Castle Rock |
Interesting Rock Formations - Photo by Dennis |
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Castle Rock |
Looking down at the Falls |
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Castle Rock |
Castle Rock State Park Home Page
Trail Map or Castle Rock Location Map
