VISITORS WELCOME
Park to unveil new access to rugged backcountry
It has everything a Bay Area park could want. Oak woodlands. Rainbow trout. Golden eagles. Meandering trails. And breathtaking views of the Diablo range and Santa Cruz mountains.
Hollywood crews even filmed Julia Roberts’ first movie here.
Yet one thing is missing: the public.
Come Saturday, that will change as one of San Jose’s newest and most scenic parks, Rancho Cañada del Oro Open Space Preserve, unveils new public access to its rugged backcountry.
A parking lot for 24 cars, along with restrooms, a horse trailer parking area, fences and trail signs will open Saturday at a public celebration.
The ‘‘ staging area’’ as park planners call it, will provide the first route for the public to easily set foot in the trails on the 3,017- acre preserve.
‘‘ There are old ranch roads here that are very nice to walk on,’’ said Patrick Congdon, general manager of the Santa Clara County Open Space Authority, property.
‘‘ And when you walk up these canyons it is like stepping back in time.’’
The preserve, two minutes south of Cinnabar Hills Golf Course in South San Jose, sits on the southern flanks of Calero County Park. It features extensive oak woodlands and spring wildflowers. It is home to mountain lions, red- tailed hawks, deer — even wild turkeys — and features several miles of pristine Llagas Creek.
A collection of cattle ranches in San Jose’s south foothills for more than 100 years, the property was annexed by the city during the frenetic development era of the 1950s and 1960s when then-City Manager A. P. ‘‘ Dutch’’ Hamann spread San Jose across orchards, hillsides and rural valleys. But as a government agency that owns the