Rock Hounding in Pacifica California for Easter
The straps of the Osprey backpack weigh on my shoulders as our new hammer, one side a sharp hatchet, is hooked onto the side strap. I don’t mind the weight. My eyes graze the ground. I’m searching. There are hundreds of them in front of me, but I’m looking for signals that tell me what I am looking at is more than it first appears.
On April 1st, I realized Easter was less than a week away. My mom still sends me an Easter basket, and I always indulge in the chocolate See’s egg that she sends in it. Other than that, I don’t really celebrate the holiday.
This year, I felt tempted to do something different.
Luckily, I had an idea.
A few months ago, my boyfriend and I had discussed picking up a new hobby. But not just any hobby would do. We wanted something we could do outdoors. We wanted something active, but not as active as some of the other activities we like to do (jogging, skating, attempting to surf, and dying on hikes).
The ideal activity? Rock hounding!
I don’t know much about Jesus, but I know that he came out from behind a rock when he was resurrected, and that felt like a sign that we should go looking for rocks.
Picking Up Rock Hounding Supplies in Pacifica
A quick Google search told me that there was great rock hounding to be had in Pacifica, specifically Basalt and Jasper. We also had a Rock Hounding book, and I had the Rock Identifier app pre-downloaded, so we were ready to go.
We fueled ourselves with a ton of caffeine and a smoothie filled with bananas, yogurt, adaptogens, cinnamon, and protein.
Then we hit the road, driving twenty minutes to Pacifica. The coastal road wound down toward the ocean, a gray-blue of the water set against the clear blue sky. We turned down to where my cousin had stayed in her Airstream only a weekend before, then crossed over to the local Ace Hardware to pick up some supplies.
We found a bucket (we had big plans to do a beach clean-up after we rock hounded), a pick hammer, and some suet for the birds who live in his backyard. Then we got back into the car, stopped at Starbucks for yet more caffeine and a pee, then headed to the Pacifica Quarry Running trail.
Rock Hounding on the Pacifica Quarry Running Trail
Turning into the small oval-shaped parking lot at the trail head, we couldn’t believe our luck when a car pulled out and their parking spot opened up. We pulled into the spot, then unloaded our gear.
One backpack. One pick hammer. Our Rock Hounding book. Two water bottles. A shovel.
From there, we entered the trail and walked up from the paved path onto the dirt trail to the left. We followed it along and began our first rock-hounding adventure.
The grass on either side of the trail was lime green, and spring wildflowers dotted the hills. Straight ahead, the ocean beckoned. We scoured the ground, trying to find something that looked unique against the hundreds of stones that littered the sandy trail.
The first rock we picked up sparkled in the sunlight, white shiny stones with dark gray specks. We did a quick search with the Rock Identifier app, and it identified it as Diorite, a type of Igneous rock, and fairly common in this area.
Our goal was to find some Jasper.
Next, we picked up a Basalt stone and soon had fun finding various versions of this rock type, some more gray and others more green.
On a fallen tree, bleached white from the sun, a lizard did push-ups to show off and waited for us to take his picture. The brown and tan of his skin looked like plaits.
We continued picking up stones, then returned to the path. Trying not to mistake abandoned snail shells for pretty rocks. We dropped one of the stones we found after reading that it was radioactive.
A Crystal on the Path
My boyfriend shouted from up ahead on the trail.
“The hammer!”
I jogged over and handed him the pick hammer. He used it quickly and rose with a freaking crystal in his hand. It looked like something I’d purchased in a gem shop as a teen, and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Had we really just found this growing in the ground?
It was a quartz and had geometric sides cut perfectly from nature. It had gone unnoticed by trail runners, dog walkers, and bikers who were getting their morning exercise.
For first-time rock hounders, we couldn’t believe our luck!
We realized going slightly off-trail into open grassy areas could help us discover wider varieties of rocks, and we took our time dusting off stones and digging until we had a good amount of Jasper, Serpentite, Calcite, as well as a few other common types of stones, like Quartz and Quartzite.
Remembering to Look Up While Rock Hounding
The trail has areas where you can sit and look out across the hills toward the sea or toward the bucolic scenery of rolling landscapes with grasses in shades of lemon and chartreuse with tufts of emerald green trees.
It was important to remind ourselves to stop and look up from the ground every once in a while to appreciate where we were and how impressive it was to find this so close to the city.
After climbing up one of the trails before the last stretch toward the seaside cliffs, we decided the heat was finally getting to us. We wouldn’t check until later, but it turns out it was an 80ºF day, and we were desperately dehydrated despite drinking 16oz of water each.
We turned around and hiked back to the car.
We’d spent just over an hour-and-a-half on the trail, looking at rocks and finding new versions of those that we now saw as uncommonly common to find.
We were starting to get hungry, and after a quick drive around the beach parking lot, we decided we’d schedule our beach clean-up for another day, and we should head back to the city for lunch.
Barebottle Brewing and Impossible Smash Burgers
We drove to Barebottle Brewing and ordered some Athletic N.A. beers and a smorgasbord of bar food. We were quite hungry and scarfed Impossible double smash burgers and garlic fries. It was the perfect end to a day spent in the hot sun, searching for rocks, and I felt like it was an Easter Sunday well spent.
Rocks, brews, and Battlestar Galactica, as they say.
Here’s to another perfect day in the Bay.
