50 Best Short Hikes San Diego

Discover the Best Hikes in Southern California's Showpiece City

Beaches, urban settings, nature preserves, and mountain peaks beckon locals and visitors alike. Join longtime residents Don Endicott and the late Jerry Schad in one of America's most stunning metro environments. Enjoy sidewalk strolls in historic neighborhoods. Hike to wildflowers, waterfalls, and panoramic vistas that are sure to keep your camera clicking. Whether you have an hour or all day, 50 Best Short Hikes: San Diego serves up diverse routes within 30 miles of San Diego's central core.

Experience 50 easy-to-find, easy-to-follow trails, from 1 to 8 miles in length. Explore beautiful locales like Del Mar Crest and Beach, Elfin Forest Recreational Reserve, Rice Canyon, La Jolla's Coastline, and Hollenbeck Preserve. The book's at-a-glance hike descriptions and complete route details ensure that you know what to expect before you begin. Plus, you'll know where you are and where to go with overview maps for 5 urban regions, 50 trail maps, and even GPS coordinates for each trailhead.

A retired civilian research engineer in the field of Navy communications and network technologies, Don Endicott discovered a second career as a volunteer naturalist. He is an NAI Certified Interpretive Guide, presenting multimedia campground and visitor center talks at Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Cuyamaca Rancho State Park, Mission Trails Regional Park, and San Diego County Parks. Endicott is a regular volunteer field contributor at Cabrillo National Monument for faunal surveys and intertidal interpretation and monitors a wild breeding pair of peregrine falcons at Cabrillo National Monument. An avid hiker and climber, he has enjoyed more than 50 years exploring and photographing wildlife and remote wilderness settings throughout California and the western states and has stood atop many of the region’s highest summits. Prior to retirement, Endicott served as a Sierra Club National Outings Leader.

A long-time hiking and running companion of Jerry Schad’s, Endicott partnered on field research leading to the first edition of Afoot & Afield: San Diego County. He advised and supported fieldwork for the fifth edition of the book with coauthor Scott Turner. Endicott contributed hike write-ups and photography for “Roam-O-Rama” and the recently published San Diego Natural History Museum’s Coast to Cactus: The Canyoneer Trail Guide to San Diego Outdoors. His photography has been featured in print and online publications for Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Cabrillo National Monument, Yosemite National Park, and the Yosemite Conservancy. This is his first book.

Jerry Schad’s several careers encompassed interests ranging from astronomy and teaching to photography and writing. Schad held bachelor’s and master’s degrees in astronomy, taught physical science and astronomy at San Diego Mesa College, and chaired the Mesa College Physical Sciences Department.

Schad was the author of 16 books, including a college-level textbook for introductory physical science courses and the top-selling Afoot & Afield series of hiking guidebooks that cover nearly all of Southern California. He became interested in astronomy at age 12, took up astronomical photography a few years later, and had some 1,500 astronomical photographs published in media around the world.

Schad’s outdoor column, “Roam-O-Rama,” was published weekly in the San Diego Reader 1993–2011, and his San Diego Reader blog, “Outdoor San Diego,” kept San Diegans up-to-date on a variety of natural events in the sky and on Earth.

At one time, Schad ran a 100-mile trail race across the Sierra Nevada in 24 hours. He also bicycled 352 miles from San Jose to the outskirts of Los Angeles in even less time.

In the last year of his life, Schad enjoyed spending time with his wife, Peg Reiter, as they walked, hiked, traveled, and enjoyed time in their high-rise residential tower in downtown San Diego.

In the months preceding his death at age 61 from kidney cancer, Schad worked tirelessly and with courageous joy and spirit to complete the final stages of the first edition of this book.