Find the right trail to boost your health and wellness in the Santa Cruz mountains with our Trails Rx program. With Dr. Hackenmiller's tailored suggestions for each trail, you can get the most health benefits and connection to nature from your time outdoors.
NEWS: Sempervirens Fund Launches Trails Prescription Program for the Santa Cruz Mountains
Sempervirens Fund’s Trails Prescription Program, also known as Trails Rx, encourages people to explore the outdoors by promoting the health and wellness benefits associated with spending time in nature. Trails Rx gives clinicians and patients new options to turn a recommendation for time in nature into a specific ‘prescription’ for where best to go outdoors and benefit from a specific place, or trail.
Introduction to Forest Bathing
Forest bathing, or “Shinrin-yoku” as it’s called in Japan where the practice was founded, is a way of immersing your senses in nature that has proven benefits for our physical and mental well being. Time in nature can boost our immune systems and creativity, settle our minds, and lower our stress levels. But how do you forest bathe? While an actual bath in the forest is not required, here’s an introduction to get started improving your connection with nature and your health.
ParksRx and You
Parks prescriptions, or ParksRx, is a movement based on the fundamental idea that spending time in nature is good for your health. In California’s Bay Area, most counties host a ParksRx program, often connecting parks and public health departments. They provide resources for clinicians and doctors to recommend, like reminding a patient to exercise, spending time in nature as part of your health and wellness plan.
Our Vision
We believe wild and thriving redwood forests can flourish again from Silicon Valley to the Pacific Ocean. With your help, we can establish a large, interconnected, and protected network of healthy trees and streams, stretching across public and private lands. Learn more about our vision.
Our Work
Healthy, connected coast redwoods ensure vibrant habitat, clean air and water, and climate resilience. Your support purchases, restores, and safeguards redwood forests in the Santa Cruz Mountains, ensuring they will never be developed, degraded, or destroyed. Learn more about how we work.
Most people glimpse their first redwood in a public park. Your support expands our great local redwood parks, sharing new destinations with the public, and helping make the land more accessible and welcoming for everyone. Discover the redwoods of the Santa Cruz Mountains.
The redwood forests we protect are strategically identified for their ecological and conservation values. Many of these lands serve as critical habitat corridors. And redwoods are resilient allies in the fight to address our climate crisis. Explore Redwoods Science.
We work in the forests, repairing and restoring the delicate balance of life, protecting and healing the best habitat. You can volunteer with us—helping tend to the forests—and you can fund the stewardship of the redwood forests you cherish. Learn more about caring for our lands.
