Redwood Adventure

Day 2 was the start of our time in the redwoods. Looking back, I think we maybe planned too many things to see. There is no limit to the amount of amazing, beautiful, quirky or otherwise interesting things to see and do along this stretch. Before the trip, I'd searched out lists of things and tried to narrow it down to a few stops each day that would give us a well-rounded experience of what is out there, but it's hard to not want to see it all. And yet, our favorite spots could have been enough on their own. We crammed a lot in each day, but at the same time this trip mostly felt like we were slowly making our way up the coast, with lots of outside time and exploring. It definitely felt more like a journey and less like driving to get to our location. So maybe, for this first trip up there, we did it just right after all.

We were definitely glad that we made a sudden stop at one of the first pullouts along the coast that morning. Not only was the craggy coastline breathtaking,

but we found a whale! It was a ways off, so not the easiest to get a picture of it, but you can see a bit of the head and back in the lower left quarter of the picture. We watched it swim north for several minutes--every time it surfaced to breathe, we could see the spray and just a little bit of the whale. It was too far away, and not coming out of the water enough to tell what it was, but still so cool to see.

And this view wasn't too shabby, either. 

An unplanned stop, but so worth it!

 The next stop was planned. When you search for sights along the northern CA coast, you get all types of quirky locations, like the One-Log House. We didn't actually go inside because it didn't really seem like it was worth paying for, but we saw it from the outside.

And then, we walked next door to see the Grandfather tree--an 1800 year old redwood giant. If I had any idea how many huge, amazing trees we were going to see in the forests coming up, we may not have bothered with this stop at all, but this was the beginning of the trip and we were excited to see a big tree. (This is not saying that we stopped being excited to see big trees--more like we got to see some forest areas that are pretty much the most beautiful places we've ever been, so a stand-alone tall tree is no longer quite as amazing.)

Because next up was the Avenue of the Giants--over 31 miles through the redwoods with tons of hiking trails, groves of trees, a visitors center--it's incredible!

Pictures do not do it justice. Neither do words. The feeling of walking into a shadowy forest filled with ferns,

 sorrel, 

and towering trees that have been around for hundreds, or even thousands, of years, can make you feel small and insignificant. 

We did a couple short hikes at different stops. First, at the F.K. Lane Grove, we did a 1/2 mile loop. Most of our conversation centered around Ewoks, speeders racing through the forest, and exclaiming that we'd found the tallest tree.

 

Oh, and finding faces or profiles in the burls on the trees. I love the hook "nose" on this one.

We also spent a lot of time trying to identify the flora. We didn't pick up a fern guide until the next day, so we spent another hike trying to tell the difference between all of those.

Redwood Sorrel

White Trillium

Redwood Violet

  

And SO much moss.

I think we could have all stayed here for hours. The kids were happy just running around on the trail. Even Peanut, who has been a little difficult to keep happy while hiking, was enamored with this one. But eventually, we had to move on.

We stopped at the next location on the auto tour guide--Bolling Grove--for quick run around, and started to realize that we weren't going to be able to stop at all of them. 

The next location was the visitor's center which we thought was worth it (and that was where I found out about the horsetail from the day before=good stop!)

We did another hike across the road so we could see the third largest tree in the park

It felt like the trees should become less fascinating (I even heard one ranger tell someone that once you've seen one tall redwood, you've seen them all (!), but they didn't. 

(Our blurry attempt at a Bigfoot interpretation of Abbey Road.)

Finally, we made one last stop to look for an albino redwood. It's hard to tell from the picture, but these leaves from the tree were white. Apparently there are a few dozen of these scattered through the redwood forests--a unique condition to redwoods because normally, plants that can't produce clorophyll can't survive, but because the redwoods roots entertwine, they can get the needed sugars from the trees around them.

But more amazing than the tree itself was our search for it. We parked about 1/4 mile farther down than we should have, so we had to hunt for awhile to find it. We were also running out of time, so we took off running down the narrow trails through the forest that was completely covered in sorrel. It was something out of a dream. We lost Daddy-o during the search, but once we found the tree, I texted him and he was able to find us.

And then, after we thought we'd left the sight seeing behind for the day, we found a huge herd of elk just outside the town we were staying in that night! There were probably 100 or so, just grazing in a field by the side of the highway. Pretty nice way to end the drive.

And then we had this house to come home to for a couple nights--so nice to spread out a little, be able to cook our own food, have time to play games, draw, write, and do laundry. Especially with a lot of drizzly hiking ahead of us, it was nice to not just be tracking mud into a little hotel room.

Northwest Road Trip

Daddy-o and I decided that it was about time that we made it up the coast of CA to OR, since neither one of us had ever been, 

so that's how our Spring Break Northwest Road Trip was born--7 days of redwoods, beaches, hiking, and family time.

First stop--the first beach we saw on the way to Mendocino. 

We were only there for a few minutes, but found remains of crabs, chitons, a sea cucumber, and snails.

But this little guy was ready for lunch, and we had a lot more beach time coming up, so we cut the stop short and went into Mendocino. 

We pieced together a lunch from the grocery store and a pizza place, wandered around for a little while, and then went to the next stop.

Point Cabrillo Light Station. We had a 1/2 mile walk down to the lighthouse--just the right length to stretch our legs and act as a warm up to the hiking we were planning to do the next couple days.

The light was enchanting,

and the ocean was beautiful. The CA coast is amazingly wild. I will always prefer swimming at East Coast beaches, but I don't anything quite compares with this.

Any guesses what this is?

Sea foam! There was a channel leading to a cove that was just filled with this!

A perfect, classic lighthouse.

We were able to go in one of the keeper's houses which was set up as a little museum sharing what life would have been like for the keeper's wife back in the early 1900s. It wasn't an easy life, but it's hard to feel too sorry for them knowing that they had these amazing views all day long.

What a great writing spot!

Peanut convinced everyone that he needed help hiking back up to the parking lot.

Peanut is lucky to have all these bigger people who are willing to help him out when his legs get tired.

The first of many plants that we identified--this one remained a mystery until the next day when I happened to notice a botanical drawing in a Visitor's Center showing the fertile and non-fertile horsetails (this is the second variety).

If there is a log, they need to climb it.

And do yoga on it.

These three are pretty good travelers and explorers.

We had one final road trip stop for the day--Glass Beach in Fort Bragg. I have a small sea glass collection and I was really looking forward to visiting this beach.

It did not disappoint. In some spots, there was more glass than pebbles.

We found glass of pretty much every color--even a bright yellow and a couple red pieces.

If we had ended the night with this sunset, it would have been perfect. Unfortunately, we still needed to get dinner, which ended up being a 1.5 hour excursion in Denny's. Our waitress just didn't seem to be up to the crowd that showed up--I'm pretty sure that she didn't get our order in when she said she did because we watched table after table get their food, even when they'd shown up long after we did. Considering it was almost 8 when we got there, we were really not wanting to have a long, leisurely dinner.

Eventually we made it back to the inn we were staying at, which we refer to as the hippy inn--it's a beautiful old house converted into an 11 room inn that serves a vegan breakfast. Pretty much, it meant they had a fridge with some gluten free bread, sprouted bagels, and instant oatmeal. Not the greatest breakfast, but a fun place.