North Table Mountain / Glory Hole Recreation Area

Chico to Moccasin, CA | Hiking in North Table Mountain Ecological Reserve | Camping at Beals Point Recreation Area | Hiking in Glory Hole Recreation Area | December 2026

I have to admit, these days of this vacation were not our favorite. The cloudy days were weighing us down, we were discouraged by the lack of free outdoor activities and camping options. We were excited to move on and visit Yosemite, Kings Canyon, and Sequoia, but felt guilty speeding through this part of the country that we had never seen before. It made these days long and difficult, but once we talked out our frustrations and agreed that maybe this just wasn’t the right time for us to be here, it made it easier to move on and say, we’ll try again some other year. After all, our motto is unofficially ‘We Always Return’.

We spent a long time trying to figure out what to do the day after leaving Chico, and although it wasn’t an easy plan, we decided to try to visit North Table Mountain Ecological Reserve. It had a trail with a waterfall, which we thought would be the ideal hike for a foggy day. However, the real challenge here was that we needed to somehow obtain a day pass to enter the park — and we couldn’t just have it on our phones, the website made it very clear that we needed a physical permit. Would anyone actually care? We don’t know, but we are law abiding citizens who care about recreating responsibly, so we were determined to do this right. That brought us to a Walmart in Chico where we had to explain to multiple employees what we wanted, get through the confusion, and finally walk away with two one-day passes.

Next, we had to drive to the trail, which was off a very long, winding road. The drive was slow-going, and once we arrived, we came to the trailhead— still in the middle of the thick, relentless fog. This is when I sort of hit a mental wall: it turned out the the trail went through a cow pasture, and I know it sounds silly, but I sort of lost interest in it at this point. Did you know that cows kill more people than sharks do every year?? But we had gone through so much effort just to get here, so I reluctantly agreed to go for the hike anyway. I probably should have just stayed behind, but I just didn’t feel like it was an option. We didn’t even end up walking all the way to the main attraction of the hike, but we did make it to the first waterfall, and then said good enough. On a positive note, the scenery reminded us a little of Ireland, which brought happy memories.

We then drove to Folsom, where we paid for another night of camping at Beals Point Campground. The campground was right on Folsom Lake, and might have been cool to explore some more on a nicer day, but we just weren’t feeling it today. We did get to take showers here though, and sometimes being clean is just what we need to end a day on a high note. And then after talking it over and looking ahead at the forecast, we decided it was time to throw in the towel and start heading towards Yosemite in earnest. It did feel like our luck turned around when we logged onto rec.gov and managed to snag a last-minute campground reservation in the Yosemite Valley!

Thanks to scoring that reservation, we only had one more night that we had to spend making our way to Yosemite. We made our way to CA-49, and once again found ourselves driving a long, winding road that could have been scenic, but we were still in the fog. Curtis had a meeting that afternoon, so I found a spot along the way for us to stop, eat lunch, work, and go for a hike. That brought us to Glory Hole Recreation Area. When we arrived, it was still foggy here, but as time went on during Curtis’ meeting, it began to burn off thanks to our elevation, and by the time we were ready to go hiking, it was almost completely clear! We hiked the Tower Trail, which switchbacked down closer to the reservoir, then followed the shoreline winding around towards the marina, and then we cut overland back to the trailhead where we had started — 3 miles in total.

Once we were finished with our walk, we continued driving South a little further to minimize our driving time for the next day. This brought us to a small rest area removed from the highway, right next to the Don Pedro Reservoir. It was a quiet and lovely spot to spend the night. We hope that someday we’re able to return to the valley and the Bay Area and do it justice, but for now, we were excited and ready to visit Yosemite for our first time.