Loch Lomond Recreation Area counts as Nature Rhythms’ favorite new discovery. It sits in the Santa Cruz mountains and serves dual purposes—the preserve contains the county’s drinking water reservoir, but looks like a lake and allows boating and other summer kicks. Spring wildflowers abound in the redwoods there.
Mount Umunhum
Mount Umunhum (pronounced “Um-un-um”) invokes the sound of humming and means hummingbird. It combines the root words for hummingbird in five Ohlone languages. Valentin Lopez, Chair of the Amah-Mutsun Ohlone tribal band tells the original creation story of Ohlone peoples, “How Hummingbird Got Fire.” https://ww2.kqed.org/quest/2011/07/19/web-extra-how-hummingbird-got-fire/ For some 10,000 years Ohlone and other tribes tended the…