9/12/2017 - Humboldt State Park Redwoods

Tuesday - Today was one of those days where everything seemed to be a little harder than it should be -- from finding the particular Redwood groves we targeted, dealing with awful road conditions as well as road construction on the same road, finding the trails once we found the Redwood grove, to finding something to eat.  But we persevered, saw what we intended to see, hiked the trails we intended to hike,  didn't run over or into anybody or anything, and didn't starve to death.  But this park could improve on their signage -- along the highway and for the trails, and more specific information in the brochures.  It is an impressive park, and the redwoods here are awesome:  ". . . Northern California's largest redwood park covers over 51,000 acres and stretches along Highway 101 for 40 miles. The Park has more than 17,000 acres of old growth redwoods and the largest remaining stand of ancient redwoods in the world. The oldest recorded redwood tree, more than 2,200 years old, was found in the Park."  But you have to work a little to find them!

We started out at the Visitor Center we intended to go to yesterday, so that worked ok.  We got maps, information, a redwoods cup, watched a film, and went on our way. 

 This tree is aged all the way back to 912 A.D.!!

Inside the Visitor's Center were some interesting exhibits, including a Travel Log, a camper made from one log.

 Until I walked around to the front of the camper a little later, I didn't realize a bear was driving it.

Couldn't find our first grove, the California Federation of Women's Club Grove, turned around and took a second attempt at it.  Talked to some people, and finally found it.  One of the problems is that some of their signs are parallel to the highway, instead of facing it, so they are hard to see.  "The Grove has a beautiful stone building with four fireplaces designed by renowned San Francisco architect Julia Morgan, who also designed Hearst Castle."   There was some interesting history here about the women saving the redwoods and collection donations to purchase this grove.

They have "seasonal bridges" here to cross the river, apparently they remove them during the winter.  But they appear pretty sturdy.  The river is really low right now, we could have forded it without the bridge, but we walked the bridge instead.

We found the next grove a little easier, "Founders Tree Grove."  And this one had a brochure, with numbered markings on the trail so we knew what we were seeing.

When these trees are uprooted, the root system is huge!  And it makes a pretty large divot in the ground.

The bark on these trees can be up to 12 inches thick, which protects these wonderful trees from fires and disease.  I had a tape measure with me, so we measured this one.  The tape wouldn't go AROUND the tree, Joe said we had to bring a bigger tape measure next trip.

I tried to Not take so many pictures of the trees, but some of the views were just too good to not.  I know the camera does not do justice to the magnitude of these giants.

Then we headed on to the Rockefeller Forest, but we missed the turn off due to the road construction vehicles, so we drove on to the loop trail of the Giant Tree, the Tall Tree, and the Flat Iron Tree."

 We found the Flat Iron Tree sign first, not exactly sure which of these were the one designated as flat iron so we chose this one.

We had a little trouble with this trail, not enough signage, but we dumbed onto the right one because we next came upon the Giant Tree.

You can see the color of the wood here in this one that was split open.

We came out of this loop trail at the parking lot, miracle of miracle, and were just going to skip the Tall Tree since we hadn't seen it anywhere, but Joe suddenly spotted the sign back another trail a few feet, so we did get to see that one too.  Why they can't put these signs out where you see them is beyond us.

 This one is taller than a football or soccer field at 359.3 feet.  Now that's impressive.

We found the Rockefeller Forest on our return trip, after 5 miles each way of highway in really bad shape, and two 20-30 minute stops for road construction. "Rockefeller Forest, the world's largest remaining contiguous old-growth forest of coast redwoods."  It has 13 of the 100 biggest trees in the world. We found the Rockefeller Loop Trail and headed out again.    They are not marked, but this hike was packed full of splendid, towering redwoods, as well as huge ones that had fallen over the years and became "nurse trees" for other plants, including new redwoods.

 We got the tape measure out again.  This bark measured 5 1/2".

Here's just another neat photo.

We were done with the redwoods when we finished this hike and thought we would drive north to the next little town (Redcrest) and get something to eat.  Well, there wasn't anything there, so we drove on to the next little town (Pepperwood), then on to Scotia and Rio Dell.  Couldn't find anything open that appealed to us -- mostly the bars were the only thing open.  These little towns are dying, and the businesses seem to be closing one after another.

So we got on the 101 and headed south, all the way to Garberville, which is supposed to be the "main hub" of the area.  Again, most restaurants were closed (some are only open for breakfast and lunch, I guess.)  A lot of homeless people hanging around on the streets.  We ended up going in the grocery store and getting dinner from the deli, then driving back to the RV to eat.  By then it was after 5:00, so that was lunch and dinner.

The good news of the day is that John made it safely back home with his family in Brandon, Florida, and apparently didn't have any damage from Irma.  His in-laws had a couple small trees from the neighbor blow over into their yard, but both houses had power, don't think they ever lost power.  I'm sure they were all very happy to be back home and find their houses in good shape.  And we are certainly glad they are safely back home.

Tomorrow we move again.  It was 91 here today, we are not acclimated to that heat yet, so we will be back near the coast and hopefully cooler temperatures.  But those days are just about over.  Once we head toward Grass Valley, I'm sure it will be in the 90s every day, at least.
  

9/11/2017 - Shelter Cove

Monday - Our plan today didn't quite work out so we went to plan B again.  We thought we would hike some trails in the redwoods, but Joe didn't sleep well so we decided to just drive up to the Visitor Center and get maps, then maybe go for a drive.  We headed out, our first stop at Living Chimney Tree.  Although the tree was burned out over 100 years ago, it is still alive.  From the inside, you can look up to the top and see daylight.

The inside has been cleaned out.  It is as big as a room.

And I met the resident bear on the way back to the car.

We stopped for breakfast in Miranda, which is when we figured out we were going south instead of north, where the Visitor Center was.  So we decided to continue south and make the drive to Shelter Cove, which was on our agenda for this stop anyway.  We had been told there was a lot of seaglass on the beach there.  Along this road, we came upon a gold nugget!  I have to show this picture to Collins because this is bigger than the one he found in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.

Our drive took us maybe 10-15 miles through the Avenue of the Giants, then a couple miles on Hwy 101, then another road took us to Shelter Cove.  This road was only 21 miles, but it probably took an hour.  Very curvy, up and down a coastal mountain, some road work and one-lane areas.  We pulled over just before heading down the mountain and I took a photo, but you can hardly tell where the ocean stops and the sky begins.

We reached the town and drove down to the Mel Coombs Park, where there was a statue, a lighthouse, tide pools, and lots of seals and sea lions barking on the rocks.

We spent a little time here, checking out the tide pools, picking up pieces of shells, and getting closer to the seals and sea lions.  We believe there were harbor seals as well as California sea lions out on these rocks (and birds).

We clamored up the boulders, Joe more than me because I didn't have the right shoes on. 

 There are some little shells or snails attached to this boulder.

From here, we drove into town and found the Visitor Center, which is at an Inn.  She didn't know anything about seaglass beaches, but she gave us a little map she printed, a tidal chart, and sent us on our way.  We found our way to Black Sand beach, had a hard time figuring out how to get down to the water.  We ended up parking up high, walking down to the handicap parking lot, then hiking down the trail to the beach, where we trudged through very thick gravel to get to the water.  It was a pretty coastline, the sand was black, but we didn't see any seaglass, or even very many pretty rocks. And no agates. They were all just black.

A sleeper wave caught Joe so he had wet shorts and shoes.  We decided this could not be the beach we had been told about, so we didn't spend much time here.  We trudged our way back up to the parking lot.   We drove back into town and followed the coastline, checking out any outlooks we came upon.  But none of them had beaches -- they were just rocks.

 The waves made their own waterfalls as they drain off these rocks.

We stopped at Seal Rock, and could see the seals and sea lions out in the water.  They really work this coastline -- must be a lot of food along here for them. 

We decided to go find some lunch and see if anyone knew anything about seaglass here.  The lady at the deli only knew one other beach, by the boat ramp which we had driven down earlier, but she had never found any seaglass there.  But we drove back down there, right at high tide.  The waves came all the way to the cliff walls, so we gave up on that.  Maybe we just got some bad information to start with.  Everyone told us that the seaglass is at Ft. Bragg, which we had read about too. So we gave up on Shelter Cove, although it was a pretty little coastal town, and headed back our curvy road.  We got back to the 101, and found out our on-ramp was closed, so even that became difficult.  But we made it back, pretty worn out from our unsuccessful efforts.

But we made reservations at Ft. Bragg for our next stop.  One more shot at seaglass before we head inland on Friday.

9/10/2017 - Drive to Myers Flat, Avenue of the Giants

Sunday - After our eventful evening, it was time to move on today when Joe was rested enough to get out of bed.  We had a great time here at Patricks Point, but we are ready for some sunshine and dry weather.  While we were sitting at the table eating breakfast, Joe spotted a banana slug on the bushes right against the window!  Finally, some wildlife again.  He took some pictures, then I stood up and saw another, and another.  I think we saw about 30 before we left -- they were all over the place.  They really are yellow, more so than the pictures show.

With one eye on Hurricane Irma, we de-camped and got on the road, keeping in contact with John as the day progressed.  We had sunshine by 9:00 a.m., a surprise.  We left camp about 9:40.  Would have been a good morning to go back to the beach, but we didn't.  But we took one last picture of the sea mist through the trees -- this time with a little sunshine.

We made a stop in Eureka at Costco for fuel -- what a surprise that was to learn Eureka had a Costco, and of course we did some shopping.  The one thing on my list -- flashlight for the car -- they were out of.  So we will have to move one out of the camper so we are prepared next time.  Gas at Costco was 30 cents cheaper than elsewhere.  And Joe complained because he had to pump his own gas -- said he was going back to Oregon.   Eureka has lots of murals on their buildings, some of them pretty awesome, some rather abstract.  This one, on the front of a building supply store, is almost real-looking.

As we got away from the seashore, the temperature went up to 80.  We only drove 80 miles today, and after our long stop at Costco, we got to the campground in Myers Flat at 1:45.  We spent some time doing chores -- Joe dumped our tanks, I did laundry, Joe worked a little more on the step.   Our campsite here is a little more open than the last one (took Joe some maneuvering to get out of that one this morning, but Ole Truckdriver Joe did it).

We are camped in Myers Flat, on the Eel River, so we walked down to it, but it is really low right now, and has an algae bloom on it so we couldn't get in, even if we wanted to.

This is a rather mediocre campground, but it is in a good spot, right on the edge of Avenue of the Giants in the Redwood Forest.  The town is about 2 blocks long, population of 200, with more businesses closed than open.  We went for a drive after dinner, about 5 miles each way, and drove into some of the redwood parks, got to see some of the trees.  Actually, there is a grove of redwoods right here in the campground.  But tomorrow we will try to see everything we can of the redwood forest, then we will decide if we need to extend out time here (we are schedule to leave Wednesday).  And we have a few drives to make out of here, including a seaglass beach at Shelter Cove. 

Our thoughts are never far from Florida, the Hurricane, and our evacuated kids.  We are praying that all goes well for them, and that their damage is minimal.  I know they will be anxious to get back home as soon as Irma gets out of there.

9/9/2017 - Beachcombing day

Saturday - First of all, our Florida kids have safely evacuated to South Carolina.  That's a big relief.  When the hurricane models shifted to moving the "cone" to include Tampa, they loaded up and headed out.  I woke up at 4:50 this morning, knew I wouldn't get back to sleep with that on my mind, so I texted Bridgette, and she said they were on the road.  They arrived at their hotel about 7:00 p.m. eastern time, so they had a long day -- John, Bridgette, Andrew, Catalina, 4 dogs and a cat in their truck, pulling their camper; followed by Doug and Barbara and 4 dogs in Bridgette's truck.  I hope they all get some good rest tonight.

Our day, since it started early, was our beachcombing day.  After our successful venture of agate-hunting yesterday (we did actually find a few), we were on the beach by 6:30, in the heavy sea mist.

I couldn't find any this morning.  Joe found a couple fairly quickly,  and I think I found one before we left, but it wasn't a very successful morning for me.  I think he ended up with 4.  Of course, I did pick up a few pretty rocks, though.  We spent about 2 1/2 hours on the beach, then came back to the RV, changed into dry clothes, and decided to go into Trinidad.  We still wanted to check out the little museum and see if they had a book about agates.  On our way out of the campground, we encountered a high school track meet, which had us blocked for a few minutes.

We finally made it through this road block, and drove into town, fueled, and stopped at the museum, which was not open.  So we walked through a couple gift shops, then decided to get something to eat.  Since we had a quick breakfast at 6:00, we had breakfast again (it's about 11:00 by now)!  Then we went back to the museum, and it was still closed, although it was due to open in another half-hour.  We gave up on that, headed back to the campground, and stopped at the visitor center to see if they had a book about agates.  They had a little brochure, so we picked that up, came back to camp, and took a nap to make up for our early morning.  I slept a lot better knowing my kids had left Florida.

About 4:00, we headed out to go agate-hunting again.  Our plan was to go to our Agate Beach here in the campground, which involved a steep 1/4 mile hike down to it.  But in the parking lot, we met a couple just coming back off the beach and they said there were no agates down there - it had been picked clean.  So we decided to go back to our regular spot, Big Lagoon beach, which actually is a continuation of our Agate Beach by 2 miles.  Miraculously, the sun had come out and washed away the sea mist.  This is our pretty Agate Beach.

We went back to our Big Lagoon spot, and did our second shift of beachcombing.  It was nice to have some sunshine.  My campground brochures says "Patrick's Point is shrouded in fog much of the year.  During the summer, sometimes fog does not burn off for days at a time.  ... Temperatures are moderate much of the year, with only about a 10-degree difference in average temperatures between summer and winter.  Summer highs average 62 degrees, with winter lows to 38 degrees."  It's been 62 degrees here most of the time, a few degrees less first thing in the morning, but usually not any higher than 62 during the day.

So here we are.  Hard at it.  This time, I found two right away, and eventually I think I found a third, along with several I consider "possibilities."  Joe ended up with 5.

We worked the beach for a couple of hours, then Joe decides he will just continue on down the beach back to our Agate Beach, and I will go back to the car, then drive back to the campground and pick him up.  He really did not want to leave this place without hiking the 1/4 mile difficult trail down to our beach.  We figured we were already about a mile down the beach, so he went one way and I went the other, back to the car.  I kept watching him, and he was not making much forward progress -- he was really working the beach, searching for agates.  At one point I wasn't sure if he was still going that way, or had decided to come back with me, but I finally saw him head south, so I worked my way back to the car.  The sun was just setting (7:15).  (It wasn't as dark as this picture looks.)

 I headed back to our campground, to the Agate Beach parking lot.  That took about 15 minutes.  I got a couple of nice pictures of the beach while I waited for Joe.  The sun hadn't quite set here, as I was at a little higher elevation.

 I love this next picture.

I didn't have my binoculars, but I spotted a red shirt down there, so I thought that was him.  I decided to walk a little ways down the trail to meet him.  But instead, I met a girl coming up the trail in a red shirt.  I asked if there was an old man in a red shirt somewhere behind her, but she said she had not seen him.  Hmmmm.

 I went back up the trail to the top, and looked some more.  Now I didn't see anyone.

 So I went back to the car and waited a little while.  Then I went back over to the lookout.  Still couldn't see him.  I decided to try to call him but we had not been carrying our phones on the beach.  It rang, and he answered!  Surprised me.  He said he was not close yet, but was moving along now because it was starting to get dark.  So he had finally quit looking for agates.  But he couldn't see the trail to the top yet.  So, ok, I waited some more.  Then he called me again, said he wasn't sure if he had missed the trail but he couldn't see it. He had started up one trail but it just made a turn back down, so he didn't think that was right.  So I drove the car over toward the ocean and shined my lights, then drove around in circles in the parking lot, then parked again toward the ocean.  Finally, he saw my headlights so he knew he was in the right place.  He told me to go back to the RV and get flashlights, then come meet him on the trail.  So off I went, changed into jeans and shoes and socks instead of my boat shoes, and headed back over, not knowing if I could even find that parking lot in the dark.  But after one wrong turn, I made my way there.  Just as I was pulling in, he called again.  He had found some people, they pointed him in the right direction, so he was on the right trail, but he wanted me to still meet him, with flashlight and his walking stick, because he was pretty tired.  So off I went down the trail, armed with 2 flashlights and his walking stick.  I yelled a couple of times, but no answer.  Finally, I met some people, and they said he was right behind them.  So we hooked up, and I led him back up the trail.  A little more excitement than I needed, and he was beat. 

But all ended well.  Joe said we had better luck at this (agate-hunting) than we had panning for gold.  We have a nice little bag of agates, 12-15, with several other "possibilities," and a new stash of "pretty rocks."  We had a good time here, it was different, had a little beach time.  But tomorrow we move on.  And I need to do laundry because we have a bunch of wet clothes.