Henry W. Coe State Park
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An encyclopedia of information on the park, especially natural history, and the place to go for the latest fees, events, and policies.  This is also your best resource if you want information on being a volunteer or on other ways to help the park.

Like other "official" websites (and perhaps more than most) it strikes a pose.  The tone is not unlike that of a proud hostess showing off her household, so don't expect to find any critical views about park policy or features.

Still, it ranks among the best organized sites I've seen on the web, and if you haven't already visited it before coming here, it should be the first site you go to after perusing these pages.
Excellent new website about the 2007 Lick Fire which burned something around 40,000 acres within Coe Park.  With articles and images of the fire itself and post-burn panoramas, and updates on the recovery of the landscape.
An excellent site by a loosely organized group of citizens concerned about threats to Coe Park.  The current threat described is the proposal to build a high speed railway through Coe's Orestimba Wilderness.  Also has exposed the plans of the local water district to flood portions of the park with reservoirs.  Great graphics and photos.
Outstanding landscape images and sensitive detail images of plants and wildlife by a frequent Coe visitor, mostly from the Pine Ridge area, some from other parts of the park, including Hunting Hollow and the Mustang Peak areas.  Presented in chronological format.  

With Gena's generous permission, I've used many of her images on this website, arranged by location or plant/animal subject rather than chronologically.
park photos
Vincent von Kaenel's site has detailed intineraries of some ambitious rides—most for advanced levels only.  The best part, in my opinion, is his numerous landscape photos of the routes which make this a good website to visit even if you're not a mountain biker.  If you are, he offers sound advice to help prepare you.  I assume that English is not his first language from the type of errors in the text, but for those of us who like foreign accents, this adds to the appeal!
Jane Huber has a large, comprehensive site to hiking in parks in the San Francisco Bay area.  This includes Coe Park and she has some great photos from a March 2001 hike in the Hunting Hollow portion of the park at this link.
Kevin Gong has an informative and enjoyable selection of hiking trips he has made, including two at Coe.  One was an overnighter to Coit Lake, the other a day hike to Poverty Flat.  If you're thinking of visiting either of these areas, you'll benefit by reading of the experiences of Kevin and his friends.
A relatively easy hike to Manzanita Point well-described by "Treker Tom" (Tom Davids).  Interesting, remarkably accurate, well-written.
Beautiful handpainted wildflower photos, including several from Coe Park, by Saelon Renkes, who is a former Coe Volunteer and is the co-creator of Aquatic Animals of Henry W. Coe State Park.    
Bill Levey's website featuring both basic line and detailed topo maps of the park, with trails plotted with the help of Bob Patrie and his GPS.  You'll find more trails on these maps than my own, but use with caution: Quite a few of the trails shown are overgrown old roads and routes made by  horses which are invisible and unsigned.  Since you can't tell which trails are obvious and which not from the maps, you don't want to make any firm outing plans with these.

All the same, they are extremely useful since they show topographic contours in parts of the park on which my map shows only shaded relief.

Bill's site also has photo archives of the spring maintenance program, and of the Landmark Volunteers year 2000, 2001, and 2002 work in the park.
Erik Goetze's Virtual Parks website: The Coe section features panoramic views from Pine and Middle ridges in the Spring.  The shaded-relief map of the western portion of the park he has made was the best I've seen anywhere, including my own, until the park came out with its own topo map in 2002.  (There are several significant errors in trail alignment on Erik's map which will be unimportant to most users).  

The map is primarily included to show the locations of the panoramas.  As of this writing, several are misplotted (the panorama shown as being from near the junction of the Springs and Corral Trail, for example, is actually taken from the opposite end of the Springs Trail) but since the main use of these panoramas is to show you the park's beauty and terrain, they serve admirably well.  

Erik's full website contains panoramas of over 65 parks from the western US and Canada and is a great service well worth your browsing time.
A personal website by Bay Area backpacking enthusiast Kim Fishburn, includes some of his great images of Coe.  The link at left will take you directly to them.  He also displays some inspiring Sierra Nevada photos elsewhere on the site.




Revised 19 December 2007