East Bay Baby

If you read a certain genre of travel articles about the Bay Area, everything everywhere, from Golden Gate Park to Oakland’s Temescal district, is a hidden treasure or an undiscovered gem. While I hesitate to add to the proliferation of hidden treasures out there, I think that I actually found one. This undiscovered (or at least, very underutilized) gem is the Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline in Richmond.

The park has something for everyone. There are gorgeous views of the San Francisco Bay. There are hiking trails in the hills above the shoreline (for even more gorgeous views). There are many picnic sites, mostly shaded, with barbecues (the larger picnic sites, which you can reserve through the EBRPD, include deeper pit style barbecues). There is a bike trail around a lovely salt water lagoon. If you follow the bike trail further south, there is a fishing pier. If you follow the trail further north, there is Keller Beach, where braver souls than I can swim in the San Francisco Bay. There are large grassy fields, and even a playground. Best of all, the park is incredibly uncrowded given all these amenities. Even though we arrived at around lunchtime on a gorgeous, sunny Saturday, we pulled into a half empty parking lot and enjoyed our pick of shaded picnic sites.

I’m not sure why the park isn’t more heavily used, especially since Point Isabel, which is just a few freeway exits further south, is always packed on a weekend. It is a mystery, but for now, a very enjoyable one!

Of course, since our oldest is really train obsessed, we had to stop in to the Golden State Model Railroad Museum, which is right across the street from the Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline. The trains only run on Sundays (admission is also charged on Sundays), but the museum is open for viewing on Wednesdays and Saturdays for free! The museum is absolutely huge, the layouts are amazingly detailed, and we can’t wait to go back when the trains are running.