Wildcat Canyon Regional Park
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Wildcat Canyon Regional Park, or simply Wildcat Canyon, is a 2,428 acre East Bay Regional Parks District park mostly in Richmond, California. Wildcat Creek flows from the Berkeley Hills through the park and the city of Richmond, emptying out into the San Pablo Bay in North Richmond. The far northern portion of the park was originally a private park owned and operated by local residents and later gifted to the city, which in turn provided it to the Parks District.
[edit] Features
The park was home to Grande Vista Sanitarium (also known as Belgum Sanitarium) in the early part of the 20th century. Though the associated buildings have since burned to the ground, their foundations and the surrounding grounds (including an orchard) remain.
One trail of note is Nimitz Way, a four mile long paved trail (named after Admiral Chester W. Nimitz) that begins at Inspiration Point on the eastern edge of Tilden Park and heads north along the ridge of the hills, crossing into Wildcat Canyon Regional Park about two miles in and ending at a peak above El Sobrante. Nimitz Way is very popular with hikers, runners and bicyclists because it is relatively easy (paved, not very steep) and you have excellent views of the San Francisco Bay to the west and EBMUD’s San Pablo & Briones Reservoirs and Mt. Diablo to the east. Unknown to most of the folks who travel this trail, the two mile section that is in Wildcat Canyon Regional Park was a Nike missile base which was decommissioned in the 1970s. Today there are few signs of the missile silos and military housing that used to populate these hills.
At the mouth of Wildcat Canyon is the Alvarado Park section, which features many examples of fine stone masonry retaining walls and classical stone lamposts (which are no longer lit). Once the site of a Native American village, Alvarado Park was first developed as a privately owned public picnic ground.
Leading uphill from the north entrance is a broad paved roadway. As one ascends, it becomes soon evident why the road and the housing subdivision it was supposed to lead to was abandoned. Landslides bury portions of the road and in other places the asphalt has cracked and begun to slide downhill.
[edit] External links
- Wildcat Canyon Regional Park at the East Bay Regional Parks District website
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