Sycamore Canyon Wilderness Park

One of my favorite places in Riverside to hike and enjoy nature. There are miles and miles of trails for hiking or mountain biking. I prefer to park at the Barton Street entrance; no parking lot but there is street parking on a dead end road that leads directly to the park entrance. On the weekends it gets "busy" so arrive early for good parking. You can also enter the park through the Nature Center's parking lot off of Central Ave. or at Sycamore Highlands Park (street parking). There are no public restrooms and trashcans are only located at the main entrances. There is a small creek that runs through the park which can offer some good bird watching opportunities. I mainly come here to hike and for wildlife/nature and landscape photography. Right now the wild blooms cover the entire park. An amazing variety of gorgeous flowers. Coyotes are usual present as well, but I've never encountered any that have been aggressive. However, they do sometimes travel in packs through the park. Be prepared to share the trails with mountain bikers. While not a huge problem, you may run into a few homeless people living in the park. On hot days, plan accordingly and bring lots of water. There is very little shade throughout the park.

Beautiful hiking area with some nice hills! Some hills are a bit steep so I suggest wearing shoes with good grips at the bottom. Great place to exercise and enjoy the view at the benches. I went in May and some of the flowers were over 5 ft tall! Lots of lizards, ravens, and big ants too. Watch out for rattlesnakes! I saw one crawling away so I recommend either bringing a hiking stick or looking around before you sit down.

Good quick hike with some elevation to trail.

I'm so glad that we have miles of mountain bike trails in the city limits. There are plenty of named and unnamed trails of varying difficulty so you can always mix it up. I recommend parking on Barton St. There's a year-round stream running through the park so this place is also good for nature viewing - there's coyotes, roadrunners and other birds, lizards and more. This place is a good example of classic Inland Empire landscape.

Always a delight to hike around Sycamore Canyon. It is nice, has plenty of open space, good views, and is relatively quiet. There are a variety of paths you can take and all are at a fairly easy level of difficulty. Highly recommend for anyone looking to get outside!

This is a great place to come and hike, especially if it has rained recently. There isn't a whole lot of shade so plan accordingly. There are a lot of hills so make sure you are prepared for a good workout. The best part is by far the views you get of the surrounding areas. A stream is usually running through part of it, which makes for a nice resting place as well. Definitely recommend!

Good view at top but watch out the ground, there are so many snake holes

We've been going once a week and still find new paths everytime... Just please pick up your trash don't leave your empty water bottles behind. . . We like to go in the early morning not much people and the sun is bearable... If you have young kids it's a great place to take a note book and write down all the plant observations... We've been keeping an track of certain plants over a period of time and it's a great experience to see them grow on their own in their natural habitat. At least with my phone I'm able to search the plants using my phone with Google lens and we can even identify them