When we turned onto the Newton B. Drury Scenic Parkway, our girls were rendered totally mute for the first time on this trip. When I peered in the backseat, both girls were silently gazing in open-mouthed awe at the giant trees guarding the roadside. Finally, a national park left them speechless!
We reached Redwoods National Park by way of the 101, famous for its costal views from Seattle to San Diego. The RNP is actually a series of parks woven together beginning with creation of three state park’s in the 1920’s. Today it is one of the few national parks co-directed by the state. Because of its long pieced together history, the park is a meandering 65 miles long, only a few miles wide in some places, much wider in others. It looks a little bit like a fishhook attached to the coast.
The drive in on the 101 was spectacular. In retrospect I give Dan high marks for not hitting anything along the way – the road was visually arresting and a terrific distraction on several levels. As you leave Crescent City and proceed south into the forest you encounter your first redwoods – so enormous some of them eat into the pavement. In one case the highway service had to cut (reluctantly I presume) a 90 degree notch in one of the trees at truck height to allow tall vehicles unimpeded access. Then we had to navigate road construction, lane closures and a 6% grade. A distracting drive!
We stayed at an RV park in the middle of the fishhook on land inside the Yurok Indian Reservation. The only highlight of the RV park was rumored bear sightings at the fish cleaning station. Alas, we saw plenty of fisherman cleaning their fish, but no bear.
Our first foray into the park was a Wednesday morning hike in the Prairie Creek section of the park on the Cathedral Trees loop. We tend to be fast hikers, regardless of terrain difficulty but this hike was slow by necessity. I am not sure it is possible to race through the redwoods at all. You spend so much time looking up in reverential awe your feet shuffle along on the carpet of pine needles unwilling to speed up. The entire experience was like touring an actual cathedral. Most hikers communicated in whispers and those that didn’t attracted scornful looks from the rest of us. Picture taking was sort of futile because it was impossible to capture the majesty of those mighty trees – like the futility of capturing light coming through a stained-glass window. Hazel said it well when I pointed out a beautiful chevron pattern on a tree. She said, “nature has good taste.”
From Dan: After all our hiking here, I have to proclaim that hiking in Redwoods National Park is some of the most hazardous hiking I have ever done. It is not harder, steeper or longer than hikes in my past. It is simply more distracting. Redwoods have fairly shallow root systems. The trail is literally fraught with tripping hazards. But, you walk along and are so amazed by the trees themselves that you forget to look down. So about every three steps you trip. And every now and then, total faceplant. Some cussing ensues. But then a dozen steps later you once again are caught in rapture by the trees, forget about the roots and smack down again. It’s crazy. To be honest though, I don’t hold a grudge at all. Each skinned up knee tells the story – the trees are just that amazing.
In the afternoon we ventured along a windy, rutted dirt road to explore Fern Canyon. The road was only barely within the Ford’s capacity for off-road driving. It rather resembled the roads in Costa Rica – complete with a creek that we needed to ford at a whooping 2 miles an hour. The canyon itself was worth it though. It looked prehistoric. So much so that Spielberg filmed part of Jurassic Park in the canyon. The walls were only 50-100 feet high but they were close together forming a slot canyon with a creek running through it and ferns covering both walls. I was in fern heaven, Hazel set out to find a salamander and Dan and Ava appreciated the canyon, creek and the multiple photography challenges involved.
Our second and last day in the park was dominated by the Tall Trees grove. The grove requires a free permit which entails a trip to the visitor center first thing in the morning, a padlocked gate and another long windy dirt road. The hike was beautiful and worth all the effort – but the exercise seemed to mystify 2 curmudgeony old volunteers that tried to talk us out of it. Dan’s recounting below… We finished the day with a tour through the Lady Bird Johnson trail, so named by President Nixon when he dedicated the park in the late 60’s. We toured it with a volunteer from the Redwoods Conservancy, an organization that partners with the park to take pressure off of the Rangers. Molly was delightful and brimming with facts. Our tour ended at the actual dedication spot, complete with pictures of Nixon on a platform performing the dedication. For some reason the thought of Nixon hoofing it down a winding dirt trail in a suit, tie and polished oxfords, surrounded by secret service, made me smile. If I am ever elected President (don’t laugh, stranger things have happened!) I will make it a point to abuse the Antiquities Act to no end – and will lead the press corps on exhausting hikes to hard to access dedication spots too!
From Dan: After visiting more than 15 National Parks from coast to coast, I finally found the “angry” rangers. And to be totally fair, these guys were not really associated with the National Park; they were volunteers somehow tied to the California State system. We had read about the “Tall Tree” grove that was a decent drive away and required a pass, 1 of only 50 given out daily. To us that meant no people, no cars and a good hike. However, when we asked the volunteer, aka curmudgeon one, he responded, “You don’t really want to do that hike. The hike is long and steep; more than 800 feet in just a mile. Plus, the drive is down this really bad gravel road. We have tall trees here. Just go see them.” Since we already knew we were going to hike the next day and we couldn’t get the pass until then, we just ignored him and went on our merry way. Until we met the “helpful” volunteer, aka curmudgeon two. He asked what our plans were and we said we planned to hike the tall tress grove the next morning. He was much more succinct than curmudgeon one. He simply said, “WHY?” and then stared at us for a full minute (which we found a bit disconcerting). Carolyn finally looked back at him and said, “Why not!” Fortunately for us, the next morning we found a full ranger who, although cautioning us about the steepness of the trail, was incredibly helpful and cheerful. We got our pass and had a wonderful hike. It was absolutely worth it!
