Bucklin Trail
Trail length: 2.3 miles, connector between Mount Vision Road and Muddy Hollow Road Trail
Time: 2 1/2-3 hours at a leisurely pace (out and back)
Terrain: slope with bishop pine, ceanothus, lupines, coyote brush, grasses
Restroom? No
Parking: medium-sized parking lot
Dates visited: 7/2/16, 5/27/18, 9/2/18, 3/21/20
Favorite plants on this trail: mosses, lichens, ceanothus
Favorite spots:
Anywhere along the trail overlooking the ocean
Listening to birds in trees along the trail
Wading through the overgrown grasses that bury the trail
Spectacular views of the ocean, spanning from Limantour Beach to Chimney Rock are hallmarks of this trail. Starting at the Mount Vision parking lot, the Bucklin Trail is the first of three trails that connect to the Inverness Ridge Trail. Drakes View and Bayview are the other two trails. The Bucklin Trail begins at the end of Mt. Vision Road. The road itself has beautiful views of the ocean to the south and is bordered by flowers and lichen-filled trees and shrubs.
On one visit, about a mile in, I found the path so densely carpeted in black caterpillars I had to turn back for fear of crushing them. It's a trail densely packed with grasses, bishop pines, coyote brush, coffee bush, lupines, ceanothus, huckleberry, bracken, elderberry, trailing blackberry, mugwort, and wildflowers such as Pearly Everlasting, Western Blue-eyed Grasses, Iris, Orange Bush Monkeyflower, and Coast Indian Paintbrush. Higher parts of the trail expose decomposed granite and interesting rocks.
Volunteer Opportunity: PRNSA Field Institute
The Point Reyes National Seashore Association needs assistants for their Field Institute classes. You will spend a day training with PRNSA staff, then a couple of times a year you'll select the classes you'd like to help with. Shortly afterwards, you'll receive a confirmation of which ones you've been assigned. As a facilitator, you get to take the class for free. Normally, two facilitators help with every class. Duties include signing in class participants, making coffee (for indoor classes), talking briefly about PRNSA, and generally helping out as needed. I've been volunteering for about a year. It's a great experience to work with other facilitators and get to know the amazing field institute instructors.