Briones Regional Park is a deceptively large area. Made up of endless bubble-hills, like an uspide down egg carton, that alternate from grassy cattle grazing to dense oak.

A glance at the park map suggests you might hike around it in a day, ignoring all the distracting "little" side trails. In reality, because you are constantly going up and down these steep bubbles, you can create as many as six different unique hikes that each make a satisfying day's hike, ranging from 6 miles (really steep!) to 9 miles (just regular steep).

Briones peak, at 1483' elevation, is hard to distinguish amongst all the ups and downs.

Instead of my usual multitude of trail pictures, here is a quintessential Briones shot, plus two different views of Mt. Diablo.

From the Martinez end of the park is this view of Mt. Diablo (city of Concord below).

And from the farthest southern end of the park (Lafayette Ridge) is this view of Diablo with Walnut Creek and Lafayette below.

There is also more north of the park at Briones Reservoir ...

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