Shadow Cliffs Lake trout fishing

COVID-19 walk-in-only restrictions meant hardly any visitors at Shadow Cliffs Regional Park, in normal times a popular Bay Area fishing destination. The editor and his sister barely encountered a human presence on a sunny November Monday. (CHRIS COCOLES)

THAT LONELY FEELING

NO WALK-IN COVID-19 RESTRICTIONS LEAVE BAY AREA FISHERY QUIET AS A GHOST TOWN

By Chris Cocoles

PLEASANTON—On a normal mid-November day like this, Shadow Cliffs Regional Park would likely be far more bustling.

Hiking trails would be full of joggers, dog walkers and even horseback riders. Shady picnic tables would be a perfect spot for a local employee’s lunch hour. Toddlers would be running around with their doting parents close behind. The lake’s sandy beach would be an ideal spot for a late-fall, early-winter suntanning session. And, of course, a fairly recent California Department of Fish and Wildlife trout plant and another pending by Shadow Cliff’s concessionaire, East Bay Regional Park District, would make the lake a perfect location for an angler to wet a line, which is why I showed up here.

Instead, COVID-19 restrictions led to an outing that felt more surreal than spectacular.

WALK-IN PARADE In the summer when I fished at Lake Chabot, another popular Bay Area

urban fishery (California Sportsman, August 2020), the signs posted all over the park requiring face coverings and social distancing, plus the caution tape around picnic tables, signified that the pandemic that had turned our lives upside down was going to affect everything we did.

Now months later, cases are even higher than the early days of the health crisis. So as I plotted a lake to check out during an early November visit to the Bay Area, Shadow Cliffs seemed like a logical destination. It’s only about a 30-minute drive from my sister Charlene’s San Mateo home, and with the weather forecast calling for brilliant sunshine and a high temperature pushing 70 degrees, it seemed like a no-brainer on a Monday morning.

But while perusing Shadow Cliffs’ East Bay Regional Park District website (ebparks.org/parks/shadow_ cliffs), the content was littered with the expected COVID-19 changes to regulations.

“Notice: Swim beach is closed. No swimming allowed.”

“Boat ramp closed (no boating/ kayaking, no quagga inspection.)”

But this one at the top of the page was the money shot:

The low water level meant the shoreline was a muddy mess, sending the editor to a nearby pier. (CHRIS COCOLES) The editor’s sister Charlene and their dogs Angel and Emma were a welcome site walking into a regional park that resembled a ghost town. (CHRIS COCOLES)

“Shadow Cliffs Regional Recreation Area is open for walk-in only.”

I knew that would not only mean relative privacy – social distancing is the rage these days – but also we wondered where we’d park. On the map we noticed there was a BMX park down the street from the entrance to Shadow Cliffs, so when we got there and were greeted by a roadblock that headed downhill to the barren parking lots, Charlene dropped me off and I toted my fishing gear and our two chairs into the park. She parked at the BMX dirt parking lot – about a half-mile away – and walked our dogs down to meet me.

SHADOWS AND GHOSTS I don’t know if I’ve ever felt more alone walking into a park. When we had arrived at the entrance, we ran into a park employee who mentioned possible parking areas down the road. But by the time I’d gotten out of the car and hiked in, he was gone and I felt like the last angler in an apocalyptic fishing zombie movie.

I spotted one fishing dock on the south end of the lake but opted to start walking along what is in normal times the swimming beach. But I kept going past what I assumed was an area where fishing isn’t allowed and walked down the shoreline. I first set up on the bank, but clearly the lake was low and as my mud-covered

shoes attested, the area right against the water was a swampy mess.

Plan B stood to my right: a dock that I assumed was the closed boat ramp, which normally means offlimits to fishing (the gate was locked entering the pier from the other side, and it indeed was a no-fishing area).

But since this place was as deserted as an Old West ghost town, I moved our stuff to the pier. I felt a bit more comforted when I saw Charlene and the dogs heading down the shoreline to meet me, as I was no longer all by myself. And shortly after casting my line, we actually ran into other human beings – two park rangers who politely asked us to move to the next pier down. They said that might be better than fishing off the muddy shore between the two docks. At this point I was just looking for more normalcy than a successful fishing experience.

ONLY THE LONELY I casted my rig again – I was throwing a mix of Power Bait and some trout nuggets from Berkley Gulp! Our dogs were pretty mellow most of the morning, though my sister’s dog

Despite the lack of bites and some chilly wind, it was a glorious Monday morning to get outside. (CHRIS COCOLES)

Indeed, there was only one other angler on the lake while the editor and his sis were there. He’d biked into the park, saving himself the hassle of having to find a place to park a vehicle. (CHRIS COCOLES)

There were far more birds enjoying the day than people, so there wasn’t much of a chance the pelicans, coots and ducks were going to find a free meal. (CHRIS COCOLES)

Hopefully, this pretty lake located in the heart of the East Bay will return to normal. For now, it’s eerily empty. (CHRIS COCOLES)

Angel freaked out when a family of ducks floated by.

Fishing-wise the day turned out to be a bit of a bust. I did get what appeared to be one bonafide bite, but after reeling in, I saw the bait bandits had got the best of my Power Bait. But the walk-in restrictions meant we were essentially only sharing the lake with the myriad species of birds flying above us and taking a morning swim (I spotted just one other angler, on the far end of the lake; he’d bicycled into the park).

Besides that, it was the kind of November day that reminded us why the Bay Area is such a great (albeit expensive) place to live. While presumably other areas of the country are shoveling snow and using morning ice scrapers, it would have been T-shirt and shorts weather had the wind not picked up around 11 a.m. About an hour later Charlene and the dogs walked back to the car, I reeled in for the last time, packed up the chairs and met her at the still boarded-up entry kiosk. I actually crossed the path of a solo jogger as I walked back through the closed restrooms and boathouse on the way to the main road.

For one of the few times on this day, there were indeed signs of others also enjoying a beautiful morning in a mostly abandoned recreation area. COVID-19 is still in command. CS

OREGON

EUGENE

Maxxum Marine

1700 State Hwy. 99 N. (541) 686-3572 www.maxxummarine.com