Day 6 - Redwood National Forest

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Redwood National Forest

First off, let me say that you’ve never truly seen trees until you’ve visited the Redwood National Forest. The coastal Redwoods are amazing. The older growth Redwoods are anywhere from 250 to over a thousand years old. The newer growth Redwoods are 250 years and younger. Either way, that adds up to some big trees.

After leaving Crater Lake in the a.m, we stopped briefly at Grant’s Pass for some breakfast and Dutch Bros coffee and hit the road. The Redwood National Park runs several miles along Rte 199, and we stopped at a couple different spots. At the first stop, we were amazed at the size of the giant trees, and took a ton of pictures. The second place we stopped was called Big Tree Wayside. And yes, there was a very large tree. The forest itself was beautiful and very quite. It was a peaceful place to visit. We found a fallen tree and climbed up the trunk and walked across to the top.
The forest was filled with clover, hemlock, and other lush green plants. We agreed it reminded us of the scenes in Return of the Jedi in the Ewok Village (yes we are dorks.) We followed a trail for awhile, and found evidence that either an elk or a cougar had been on the path shortly before us. We were hoping it was an elk.

We found our way back to the trailhead without having any cougar encounters. Satisified with the number of big Redwoods we saw, we proceeded to Patrick’s Point State Park for camping. The campground was very pretty and although didn’t have as many Redwoods as we had seen, there were plenty of Douglas firs and other trees. The park is also on a bit of a peninsula, and has a beach called Agate Beach. We went hunting for Agates, which are semi-precious stones, but we didn’t really know what we were looking for. We ended up with some neat looking rocks and a cool piece of driftwood anyways.

We settled down at our campsite, and planned on waking up early for our drive to Sonoma. Can’t wait for some wine!!

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Photos

Photo 1
Entering California, finally!

Photo 2
wow these trees are big

Photo 3
really big

Photo 4
really really big

Photo 5
land of the Ewoks

Fallen Redwood
jamie on top of a redwood

Photo 7
exotic wildlife

Photo 8
talk about blue balls

Photo 9
more big trees

Photo 10
jamie climbing the real big trees

Photo 11
elk droppings. jamie thought they were cougar droppings but thanks to my degree in animal science, I was able to set him straight.

Photo 12
Easier than the first

Agate Beach at our campsite
we searched for agates for 45 minutes, thinking they were small green stones. but a 5 year old kid told us we were wrong. They were white. but on the plus side, we have a whole bunch of really cool looking green rocks!

Where did they take princess leah
These pictures don't even come close to capturing what we were experiencing. This place is Awesome.

Comments

[Matt]

Sonoma
Go to the Sonoma Cheese Factory. It's great.

[chags]

Hey
Is this the place they talk about with in the song "......Redwood Forrest, blah blah blah" Sorry I don't know anymore words to the song but I remember singing it as a kid, not knowing the words then either.

[Chris O]

Looks so peaceful! Enjoy it!