Stern Grove to Presidio

The forests of the city

Distance: 6.6 Miles Elevation Gain/Loss 920/875

This section has a good mix of urban and forest hiking and for a short time you get so immersed in the forest you can forget you are still in the city. From Stern Grove heading north, the beginning is very typical walk through town, following side walks and cross walks and stopping at traffic lights. You climb Vicente St to busy W. Portal Ave, which is full of shops and crowded with foot traffic. Then walk the quiet neighborhoods of Uloa St., which parallels the busier Portola Dr., until you reach the entrance to Twin Peaks Open Space Preserve.

The climb gets a bit more serious from there. The trail follows close to Twin Peaks Blvd before crossing it and making a direct line toward the top where you can see across the city and all the way to the east bay hills.

A section of the street along the top has been converted to walking only and has become a canvas for graffiti. Fortunately, in this instance, it seems to add character to the path and actually looks pretty good.

From Twin Peaks the trail turns toward Sutro Tower and around the north side along Palo Alto Ave. But there is a much nicer trail around the south side of Sutro Tower which joins back with the Ridge Trail and replaces 0.2 miles of sidewalks with 0.4 miles of wooded trail. I recommend that route instead.

After crossing busy Clarendon Rd., the city quickly disappears and is replaced by forests in Mount Sutro Open Space Preserve.

Occasional breaks in the trees remind you that you are still in San Francisco, and the exit onto Stanyan St. is like a sudden shift back to that reality. From there, the trail continues briefly through Golden Gate Park to Arguello St. where it makes a straight line to the Presidio, where the section ends. From there we made our way back to our car, near Stern Grove. One of the pluses of urban hiking is that finding return transportation is easy. We splurged on a driverless cab ride this time.

The official map for this segment can be found here.

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Next Segments:

Clockwise: San Francisco Presidio to Golden Gate Bridge

Counterclockwise: Mussel Rock to Stern Grove