Saturday Night Hike (July 1st) - The Forest of Nisene Marks

Place: The Forest of Nisene Marks, Aptos, Santa Cruz County, CA.

Virtual Map of Park

Date: Saturday, July 1st

Meet Time: 7:45 pm at the steel bridge (George's Picnic Area)

Hiking Distance: 7 miles

Estimated Time at Completion of Hike: Midnight

Trail: Mostly we'll be following an old railroad track (1883-1923) that was used for logging, so the trail is actually an easy grade for walking.

Sun and Moon Data: Sunset 8:31 pm, Moonrise 10:37 am, Moonset 11:54 pm. Moon will be a waxing crescent with 24% of the visible disk illuminated.

Cost: $5 per person, which covers the trail camp fee that allows you to stay in the park after sunset; and also allows you to park your car past sunset too. Please self register at the park entrance station. You may also spend the night in the trail camp too if you wish, but keep in mind there is no water other than what you bring in or filter from the stream.

What to Expect: Dark and spooky forest! Decent tree canopy but still wide open below due to the logging a century ago. This place is an excellent choice for flashlights and HIDs. There are also some interesting remnants of old wooden structures along the trail.

What to Take: Small meal and/or snack plus water and maybe a soda as we will be having a meal break in the dark. A mini lantern, headlamp, or keychain light would also come in handy for the meal break. Packing a lightweight jacket is recommended.


Attendance List:
- LowBat + Guest
- CroMAGnet + 3 Guests

Re: Night Hike - The Forest of Nisene Marks

That's nice. Wish I could go, but recent events will prevent me from going on any hikes for the time being. My father had a massive brain hemmorhage (as the neuro-surgeon called it). Have to care (and be there) for my mother until we know what happens next with my father. Trying times. . .

Re: Night Hike - The Forest of Nisene Marks

Sorry to hear that Clarence. Dang! Hang in there buddy.

I'll be at the night hike. It looks like another great choice again.

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Re: Night Hike - The Forest of Nisene Marks - July 1st

CHC, I hope things turn out ok for your dad.

Re: Night Hike - The Forest of Nisene Marks - July 1st

One more signup. Looks like this will be a very small group for tomorrow night.

Re: Night Hike - The Forest of Nisene Marks - July 1st

I've got me and a Guest.

Who else is coming?

You and ?

I'm stoked

Woops, lost Mike, back to three attending.


I'm surprised we're not getting more signups. This place can be really dark and eerie. I can't think of when a flashlight would be more fun. :devil:

OK, getting some last day sign-ups from non-flashaholics. Looks like we'll be a group of six taking the plunge into the dark forest.

Just got back from a great night hike! Thanks again LowBat for the great research and choice. I can't believe my wife and her friend came. Looks like they really liked it. Sort of a sense of accomplishment thing

As usual my McGizmo lighte were my fave. Those reflectors are outstanding. And I was using a couple of LE's with uPIC's so I could dial in just the right amount of light which helped conserve a lot of battery power, greatly extending runtime.

Once again the A19 reflector put out a very useful wall of light with a very small hotspot so didn't affect your night vision. This time I used the A1 a lot which was really nice because it had a bigger spot for better throw but had a lot of spill. These two worked well with the headlamps.

The two headlamps I went through were the new PT Quad and the Petzl Tac Tikka Plus. Both were excellent with the quad putting out more light on high which was not needed and I wished it had a red flip-down lense like the Petzl.

One more thing that was really impressive was the new reflectors that Modamag designed. I was using a medium stipple and that beam was so smooth with an even transition from the hotspot outward. It really thru well for medium to long range. Sweet! Nice Job Jonathan.

Thanks again Larry

Oh! One more light that was excellent for this dense forest night hike was a Lambda MiniPro in a cutdown Minimag using one 3.7v LiON AA and a McFlood reflector. A wide even beam that was great to clearly illuminate the rocks, roots and dips in the path whether right under your feet or ten yards down the path. Very useful and bright beam.

Glad you had fun Tony. That old logging railroad grade makes a good trail, and the tree canopy was about 95% for most of the hike so we had almost complete darkness (except for what we carried ).

Nice to hear you guys enjoyed yourselves out in the dark—well you "owned" the dark with your torches! Any pics this time around? Just curious that's all—

CHC said:

Nice to hear you guys enjoyed yourselves out in the dark—well you "owned" the dark with your torches! Any pics this time around? Just curious that's all—

Click to expand...

I did try a video via my camera phone, but all it shows is the light coming off flashlights and everything else is completely dark. I think Tony took a few pics, so perhaps if they turned out he might post them.

This phone/camera short video clip shows how it was.... DARK!