The Valley of the Moon from Jack London State Historic Park
Highway 12 runs east from Santa Rosa to the town of Sonoma through the Valley of the
Moon, bounded by the Mayacamas mountains on the north and Sonoma Mountain to the South.
Extensive vineyards stretch along the highway on both sides.
Hood Mountain Regional Park, located north of Highway 12 on Los Alamos
Road features a hiking trail to the top of Hood Mountain (2,700 foot elevation) with
magnificent views of the Valley of the Moon and under favorable conditions, the towers of
the Golden Gate bridge and the tops of buildings of San Francisco. Closed during the fire
season and on week-days. Open week-ends and holidays.
Sugarloaf Ridge State Park, located north of
Highway 12 on Adobe Canyon Road, offers 49 developed family campsites, a group camp,
picnic sites, and 25 miles of hiking and riding trails. The coastal mountain terrain of
the 2500 acre park has a range of elevation from 600 to 2729 feet, with the camp and
picnic sites set in a large valley with meadow and stream at 1200 feet. Favorite
activities are camping, resting, hiking, nature exploration, and horseback riding.
Valley of the Moon Observatory,
located within Sugarloaf Ridge State Park, will be a new educational facility.
Construction will start in May 1996 and completion is expected in October 1996. The
facility will consist of a classroom with a capacity of 49, flanked by two roll-off-roof
observatories, one housing a 20-inch telescope, and the other housing a 40-inch telescope.
The telescopes will be mounted equatorially and will be controlled by computer with
custom-designed systems. Both telescopes will be usable visually (on fairly high ladders),
instrumentally (with photometers and spectroscopes), and with CCD imaging, making the
field of view accessible to many people at once, using computer technology. Once
completed, the observatory will be open at least monthly to the public and for school
related activities. Observers will also be invited to use those large telescopes for
pleasure or research.
Jack London State Historic Park is located
south of Highway 12 off Arnold Drive, 2 miles from the center of the small town of Glen
Ellen. This park offers the visitor a chance to see and feel the successes and
disappointments in the life of Jack London (1876 - 1916), one of America's foremost
fiction writers and a pioneer agriculturist. Featured exhibits on 830 acres of London's
original Beauty Ranch property include the cottage where he lived and wrote, the ruins of
his dream home - Wolf House - his grave, the Pig Palace, two unique silos, stone barns,
ruins of a former winery, the House of Happy Walls Museum and nine miles of hiking and
riding trails. Docents conduct guided tours of certain park highlights every week-end.
Read about Jack London, the author
Jack London Ranch Restoration Project
Return to the Parks Home Page
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