Puppy and poppies in spring.
Almaden Quicksilver County Park is a sprawling 4,000-acre preserve in the Almaden hills with five entrances that are gateways to over 37 miles of trail. Unlike most local parks that were once ranchos, the area was home to an extensive mining community that produced mercury beginning in the Gold Rush years up until 1971. The many roads built to move the cinnabar ore from shaft to furnace have been turned into trails that pass through the very heart of the park. Away from the former mining area, the park remains much as it was before settlers arrived, with a diversity of flowers, shrubs, and trees unmatched in the area, as well as a range of mammals and birds.
The trails at the north end of the park, closest to the city, pass through lush woodlands of oaks, bays, and buckeyes and wind their way in and out of canyons cut by seasonal creeks. The southern part of the park is 1,000 feet higher and has trails along exposed ridgelines with panoramic views of the Santa Clara Valley and the majestic Mt. Umunhum in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Almost all the trails offer spectacular wildflower displays in the spring and colorful spreads of toyon and manzanita berries in the fall.
The name: The word "Almaden" comes from the Arabic words "al", meaning "the" and "ma‘din", meaning the place of minerals, where "ma" is a word for place and "din" for minerals. The name "quicksilver" used for mercury, comes from the from the Old English "cwic", which means "alive" as in "the quick and the dead", and silver, so "living silver", which is a pretty good description of liquid mercury.