On a very nice sunny weekday on June 5th, 2018 we headed up to Mt. Tam for one of the all time views of the Bay Area, San Francisco, Berkeley, Oakland and the great Pacific Ocean that seems to stretch out to eternity. We were not disappointed.

Frank Kallop (on the right) suggested the trip and wanted his wife Kelly to see what Frank and I had enjoyed over the many years we have trucked up top of Mt. Tamalpais in Marin County, California.

Near the peak of Mt. Tamalpais, is one of the quietest places one can imagine with a phenomenal view of the San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean and the coastline heading south towards Half Moon Bay.

The expanse one witnesses is beyond the pale of awe inspiring. There nestled in the hillside below a small grove of trees is a bench, beautifully crafted from the nearby stone found on the mountain.

You can sit up there for hours and enjoy the view that seems to go on forever. But you have to go up there when the fog has not rolled in to enjoy that particular view. Otherwise you will behold another incredible experince, the shrouded fog covered Bay with the very top of the spires of the Golden Gate Bridge about the only man made object in view. The rest of what you experince is a bed of whites and grays below and blue skies above.

I came to realize that day it is one of my favorite spots on this big blue marble.

The bench was built in honor of Richard Festus 'Dad' O’Rourke, considered the Father of Mt. Tamalpais. He blazed many a trail in the area.

On this plaque pictured below it reads:

Give me these hills and the friends I love, I ask no other heaven. To our Dad O’Rourke in celebration of his 76th birthday, February 25, 1927, from his friends to whom he showed this heaven.