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I know about most of the local biking groups, and so was a little surprised on Sunday Streets to hear about WOBO, Walk Oakland, Bike Oakland. So I dutifully signed up for their Facebook page. It looks like they do more hiking than biking, so I learned about a walk this morning through "quarries" of Oakland. It looked like I could do the walk from 10-12.30 and just make it to my 1pm gaming today, so I signed up for the walk too, but was a bit tentative about whether I'd actually go or not, because it wold be a busy day.
Spoiler: I did.
So this morning, I made it out to the rooftop parking area of the recently rebuilt Safeway at 51st and Broadway. Very nice views! And as the geologist who led the walk noted, you can also see nice rock formations along the sides, because everything's been recently cut out for the rebuilding.
And, there were lots of other people there. Maybe 40 or so. Almost all white, almost all older, even older than me. Some of them lived in the area, some of them used to live in the area, and some came from surprisingly far distances about the Bay. And that's apparently WOBO's demographics, if this first walk is representative.
The walk set out not long after its start time of 10 o'clock and was mostly walking along urban streets, threading as much as possible through hidden stairways and walkways. There were far more than I expected, though I'm not sure I could find many of them again.
And, the walk went at a surprisingly fast clip, which I suppose was necessary since it was supposed to be 5 miles in 150 minutes with four stops. But, if people didn't entirely keep up, they at least didn't fall too far behind. Within a few minutes of arriving at each locale, everyone would be there. Except we did lose half of the group before the first stop, and I at first thought that's because they'd given up, but it turned out that they'd accidentally been sucked into another walking group, and only abandoned it when the leader started talking about Julia Morgan buildings instead of rock formations.
There was no discussion from the leader during the brisk walks through the beautiful streets of Piedmont (and the Piedmont Avenue area of Oakland). That only came at our stops. Meanwhile, we enjoyed the nice houses and all of the greenery and the secret paths.
We started at the Bilger Quarry, which is the one next to the renovated Rockridge Shopping Center. The most interesting things I learned: it used to be much larger, running all the way down to Broadway, making it the largest quarry in Oakland at the time; and it was owned at various times by people named Blake (but as far as I can tell, no relation to George Blake, who Blake Street is presumably named after).
Next up was Draecna Park, which has a lovely little hollow at the bottom with high-rising sides that I've enjoyably sat in which writing before. I really loved its unusual structure, and that turns out to be because it was a sandstone quarry!. In fact, the Blake Quarry And sure enough, there's still loose sandstone around the sides of the quarry. (Our geologist walk leader seemed a bit phobic about earthquakes, and he revealed that here when he noted how the sides were going to come down in a major earthquake, even with the ivy they have up stabilizing it; it wasn't the only time he fretted about mass destruction in the face of a major earthquake).
Our rapid-fire walk through Piedmont continued on to Piedmont Park, another lovely park that I've visited before, but we just barely touched upon (much as with Draecna). And, it wasn't a quarry. Our leader did talk about an alleged sulfur spring there and mentioned that Mark Twain had gone there. (I sat and wrote further up the creek on some previous day, and there's a picture of his visit.)
However, our furthest stop away from our starting Safeway was a previous quarry, the third of the day. Now it's the Oakland Davie Tennis Stadium. This is another beautiful little hollow with high walls rising up on all sides. Apparently Mayor Davie once wanted to turn it into an amphitheater, which would have been amazing, but never did. Instead it was donated to the city of Oakland from his estate. Thanks, Mr. Davie. (Except the tennis courts feel a waste of the beautiful area.) The stone here was crushed and used for roads in Oakland in the 1800s. Other interesting things I didn't know: eucalyptus was often used to ring quarries, to keep in the noise and dust.
Our only stop on the walk back was the Morcom Rose Garden, which is right off Grand, but I'd never stumbled upon it before. (I'd seen signs before, but when I tried to follow them they faded away before the Garden itself.) Nice rose garden, pretty huge (at least twice the size of the Berkeley Rose Garden), but pretty spread out too. A little rundown. I'll definitely have to return sometime when I have more time. Also, not a quarry, though interestingly it looks like our leader though it might have been a gravel pit seven years ago (he seemed much more adamant now that it wasn't).
And then we walked back to the Safeway.
Overall, an entirely nice walk. I talked with various people at different points. At one point, as we walked along a path in what's now the Linda Ave Dog Park, an older gentleman who was keeping pace with the leader and me said, "I haven't walked this path since the '50s." My jaw just about dropped and he explained, "I moved away from the area for a while." Apparently, he'd used to go to Beach Elementary School, which lies just beneath that Park. That was a wonderful bit of perspective, and I will also count myself blessings if I was that fit in my 70s or 80s(!).
I hope to see some more of these hikes before I leave, though the Oakland Urban Paths subgroup of WOBO does its walks on second Saturdays, so I can only fit that in if it looks like they'll end soon enough before my second Saturday gaming. (Which seems entirely possible, if they're in the local area like this one was, as opposed to the hills or further south.)
The walk ran about 25 minutes late, so I ended up at Endgame about 20 minutes late. Fortunately there was a turkey sausage stand literally in front of the store, due to the comic convention going on across the street. Decently tasty. There were also plenty of people in fun and attractive costumes.
We played TIME Stories at Endgame today which is one of the more delightful time travel boardgames I've played, because it has a mechanism where you can fail a co-op adventure and then repeat it, but get to take advantage of your knowledge to date. Basically, Groundhog Day: The Boardgame. And, it was one last co-op game that I can write about in the co-op book that I'm now editing and formatting, to hand off to our publisher on July 1.
We'll be playing more of TIME Stories on Saturdays, as our ongoing Seafall campaign allows.
The other Safeway that I mention in the title of this post is the Rockridge Safeway on College, which I visited on my way home from Endgame. (Confusingly, both the Safeway on College and the one on 51st have decided to brand themselves as the Rockridge Safeway. They should fight it out, with the victor getting the name, but I assume that 51st will just be like "It's over College! I have the high ground." and College will be like "You underestimate my power!" and 51st will then pointlessly cut off College's limbs.) This was a much less exciting trip, because it was just the groceries I missed getting last night because my tummy was upset.
But, it was conveniently more or less on the way home (though that meant I had to carry my bicycle panniers all around the hike earlier in the day, jammed into my backpack). It also meant my day went from Safeway to Safeway, which is a nice framing.
Spoiler: I did.
So this morning, I made it out to the rooftop parking area of the recently rebuilt Safeway at 51st and Broadway. Very nice views! And as the geologist who led the walk noted, you can also see nice rock formations along the sides, because everything's been recently cut out for the rebuilding.
And, there were lots of other people there. Maybe 40 or so. Almost all white, almost all older, even older than me. Some of them lived in the area, some of them used to live in the area, and some came from surprisingly far distances about the Bay. And that's apparently WOBO's demographics, if this first walk is representative.
The walk set out not long after its start time of 10 o'clock and was mostly walking along urban streets, threading as much as possible through hidden stairways and walkways. There were far more than I expected, though I'm not sure I could find many of them again.
And, the walk went at a surprisingly fast clip, which I suppose was necessary since it was supposed to be 5 miles in 150 minutes with four stops. But, if people didn't entirely keep up, they at least didn't fall too far behind. Within a few minutes of arriving at each locale, everyone would be there. Except we did lose half of the group before the first stop, and I at first thought that's because they'd given up, but it turned out that they'd accidentally been sucked into another walking group, and only abandoned it when the leader started talking about Julia Morgan buildings instead of rock formations.
There was no discussion from the leader during the brisk walks through the beautiful streets of Piedmont (and the Piedmont Avenue area of Oakland). That only came at our stops. Meanwhile, we enjoyed the nice houses and all of the greenery and the secret paths.
We started at the Bilger Quarry, which is the one next to the renovated Rockridge Shopping Center. The most interesting things I learned: it used to be much larger, running all the way down to Broadway, making it the largest quarry in Oakland at the time; and it was owned at various times by people named Blake (but as far as I can tell, no relation to George Blake, who Blake Street is presumably named after).
Next up was Draecna Park, which has a lovely little hollow at the bottom with high-rising sides that I've enjoyably sat in which writing before. I really loved its unusual structure, and that turns out to be because it was a sandstone quarry!. In fact, the Blake Quarry And sure enough, there's still loose sandstone around the sides of the quarry. (Our geologist walk leader seemed a bit phobic about earthquakes, and he revealed that here when he noted how the sides were going to come down in a major earthquake, even with the ivy they have up stabilizing it; it wasn't the only time he fretted about mass destruction in the face of a major earthquake).
Our rapid-fire walk through Piedmont continued on to Piedmont Park, another lovely park that I've visited before, but we just barely touched upon (much as with Draecna). And, it wasn't a quarry. Our leader did talk about an alleged sulfur spring there and mentioned that Mark Twain had gone there. (I sat and wrote further up the creek on some previous day, and there's a picture of his visit.)
However, our furthest stop away from our starting Safeway was a previous quarry, the third of the day. Now it's the Oakland Davie Tennis Stadium. This is another beautiful little hollow with high walls rising up on all sides. Apparently Mayor Davie once wanted to turn it into an amphitheater, which would have been amazing, but never did. Instead it was donated to the city of Oakland from his estate. Thanks, Mr. Davie. (Except the tennis courts feel a waste of the beautiful area.) The stone here was crushed and used for roads in Oakland in the 1800s. Other interesting things I didn't know: eucalyptus was often used to ring quarries, to keep in the noise and dust.
Our only stop on the walk back was the Morcom Rose Garden, which is right off Grand, but I'd never stumbled upon it before. (I'd seen signs before, but when I tried to follow them they faded away before the Garden itself.) Nice rose garden, pretty huge (at least twice the size of the Berkeley Rose Garden), but pretty spread out too. A little rundown. I'll definitely have to return sometime when I have more time. Also, not a quarry, though interestingly it looks like our leader though it might have been a gravel pit seven years ago (he seemed much more adamant now that it wasn't).
And then we walked back to the Safeway.
Overall, an entirely nice walk. I talked with various people at different points. At one point, as we walked along a path in what's now the Linda Ave Dog Park, an older gentleman who was keeping pace with the leader and me said, "I haven't walked this path since the '50s." My jaw just about dropped and he explained, "I moved away from the area for a while." Apparently, he'd used to go to Beach Elementary School, which lies just beneath that Park. That was a wonderful bit of perspective, and I will also count myself blessings if I was that fit in my 70s or 80s(!).
I hope to see some more of these hikes before I leave, though the Oakland Urban Paths subgroup of WOBO does its walks on second Saturdays, so I can only fit that in if it looks like they'll end soon enough before my second Saturday gaming. (Which seems entirely possible, if they're in the local area like this one was, as opposed to the hills or further south.)
The walk ran about 25 minutes late, so I ended up at Endgame about 20 minutes late. Fortunately there was a turkey sausage stand literally in front of the store, due to the comic convention going on across the street. Decently tasty. There were also plenty of people in fun and attractive costumes.
We played TIME Stories at Endgame today which is one of the more delightful time travel boardgames I've played, because it has a mechanism where you can fail a co-op adventure and then repeat it, but get to take advantage of your knowledge to date. Basically, Groundhog Day: The Boardgame. And, it was one last co-op game that I can write about in the co-op book that I'm now editing and formatting, to hand off to our publisher on July 1.
We'll be playing more of TIME Stories on Saturdays, as our ongoing Seafall campaign allows.
The other Safeway that I mention in the title of this post is the Rockridge Safeway on College, which I visited on my way home from Endgame. (Confusingly, both the Safeway on College and the one on 51st have decided to brand themselves as the Rockridge Safeway. They should fight it out, with the victor getting the name, but I assume that 51st will just be like "It's over College! I have the high ground." and College will be like "You underestimate my power!" and 51st will then pointlessly cut off College's limbs.) This was a much less exciting trip, because it was just the groceries I missed getting last night because my tummy was upset.
But, it was conveniently more or less on the way home (though that meant I had to carry my bicycle panniers all around the hike earlier in the day, jammed into my backpack). It also meant my day went from Safeway to Safeway, which is a nice framing.
