To my mind, spring starts when the wildflowers appear at Roy's Redwoods Open Space Preserve in San Geronimo Valley. When I was growing up, my friends and I used to mark the season's launch by the first day we could picnic here.
The 5 1/2-mile-long San Geronimo Valley, over White Hill west of Fairfax in Marin County, sees many visitors briefly as they whiz through on Sir Francis Drake Boulevard en route to Point Reyes National Seashore. But the towns lined up here--Woodacre, San ...