Ocean View Trail to Panoramic Highway, Muir Woods, CA

This hike was an end of summer journey with my daughter, Fiona. She had never been to Muir Woods and I hadn't been there since I was a child so this was a fresh experience for both of us.

Muir Woods itself is such a beautiful place. I ended up with a sore neck at the end of the day from all the craning up I did, looking at the massive redwoods and trying to get decent pictures for the blog.

Luckily we arrived early enough to get good parking. This lot fills up FAST, so if you want to get parking, arrive early (before 10:00AM), especially on Fridays and weekends. Parking is free and the admission fee for Muir Woods is only $7 for adults. Adults are anyone over the age of 15, so my daughter got in FREE! Woohoo!

I didn't really plan ahead and so, as we wandered into the heart of Muir Woods, we decided to take the first trailhead we came across which was the Ocean View trail. This proved to be a fairly steep trail but not very long (about 3 miles round trip, out and back). Most of the trail is covered in shade and it is a well worn but well maintained trail. I marveled at the shininess of the tree roots, worn from years of pedestrian traffic across them, that occasionally crossed our path.

When we emerged from the tree line at Panoramic Highway, we were winded and sweaty, but proud of our accomplishment as we looked out onto our view of the Pacific Ocean. It felt like a very good hike. I'm a little sad that Fiona has to go back to school, but I know we have lots of hikes together in our future. We had a good summer.