The Surprising Biodiversity in Golden Gate Park

I thought I’d hiked every trail in Golden Gate Park in over two decades exploring the park. But on a sunny morning in May, I headed up a hillside on a small, steep trail I’d somehow missed. At the top, I looked down over the park’s outdoor roller-skating rink and JFK Promenade. And then I looked down at my shoes.

My feet were sinking into a deep patch of sand. It was a reminder that if you were to pull up the carpet of green that covers most of Golden Gate Park, you’d find what was once named the “Great Sand Bank”— a thousand acres of sizable sand dunes made from when eroded granite washed down from the Sierra Nevada over the millennia and sculpted by the fierce winds coming off the Pacific. These dunes were then stabilized, shaped, and planted to become the contours and canvas of the park you see today.