The Edge of Piedmont and Oakland

The forecast was for a cool morning with some clouds for our Walking on Wednesdays walk last Wednesday, but instead it was a beautiful a great fall day for a walk. A number of group members had told me that they were going to miss the walk because of fall travel and vacation opportunities, but fourteen walkers and two K-9 friends enjoyed the walk and time together. Our Piedmont Recreation Department activity started just over six months ago and over sixty walkers have participated thus far. As you know there is no obligation to come, and people come when they can, but the number of walkers on any given Wednesday has been about fifteen, with a couple of K-9 friends. This has proven to be a good number for conversations and personal

interaction.

Another positive aspect of the participation has been that very often a new walker will join us each week. This was the case last Wednesday with new Piedmont resident Nimai B joining the group. Nimai's husband, Bret, is the new Piedmont Fire Chief and the family recently moved to Piedmont from the Fresno area. Nimai and Bret's children are grown and Nimai told me

that she thought Walking on Wednesdays would be a good way to meet Piedmonters. It was certainly good to have Nimai with us.

At the start of last Wednesday's walk I said there are streets around my home on Florada Avenue at the edge of Piedmont and Oakland that I thought the group would enjoy walking. We have the informal objective of eventually walking every street in Piedmont and going to Florada Avenue would check it off our map of visited streets. So off to Florada we went, going up Highland to Wildwood Avenue, where the leaves on the trees lining the street have taken on their seasonal, red color, through Wildwood Gardens to Woodland Way and LaSalle, and finally on to Florada. Along the way we stopped for the attached group photo in front of a lovely home at Wildwood

Gardens and Woodland Way that has beautiful, large tree and garden.

While on Woodland Way Dave DeRoche pointed out the backside of the former Frank C. Havens home on Wildwood Gardens, which was one of the early Piedmont homes. From its front the home looks relatively modest, by Piedmont mansion standards, but looking through the trees we could see the size and extent of this impressive home. We have commonly noted that

walking provides opportunities to see things that car drivers miss, and this was another case of it. After walking the full length of my short Florada Avenue, which for some reason becomes Portal Avenue at the Oakland border, we doubled back to LaSalle for a nice walk up Muir to Crocker, Wildwood, Sharon, Highland to our Exedra starting point. It was another enjoyable walk on a beautiful Piedmont day, talking with friends and meeting new ones.