The Pacific Coast Redwoods - September 8, 2008
The Redwoods National and State Parks
Today was a great day, we said as we made our way back to the motor home after stopping for pie at the Palm Café in Orick. Homemade pies made by Mrs. Martha Peal, owner of the Palm Motel & Café on the Redwood Highway. We started our day at the Palm Café, each with a Redwood Country breakfast of biscuits and gravy, eggs over easy, golden hash browns and a slab of ham for me and some bacon for Lou. Coffee was good, too. Best home cooked breakfast that rated right up with the breakfast we had enjoyed at the OK Café in Tombstone, Arizona some six years ago or so. We noticed the pies and inquired about them. Soon as we found out they were hand made by Martha, we promised we’d stop by on our way back.
Our first stop was at the Redwood information center in Hiouchi, just east of Crescent City on Highway 199. I had planned our scenic drive route the night before and I wanted to make sure the roads were still open and if there were any “must see” stops along the way. Good thing, too, because we found out about the Stout Grove on the scenic Howland Hill road. that meanders through the Jedediah Smith Redwoods state park. It was the perfect highlight of our tour. The drive through these giants was magnificent and the 0.5 loop trail through the Stout Grove was unlike any other redwood grove we had ever visited. This was called a first growth forest, one that is still growing and the trees are gigantic! The understory is mainly sword-ferns and some other brush and is kept neat and clean by the regular flooding of the nearby Klamath River. The rangers at the Jedediah state park visitors center, located in the campground across from the Redwood information center mentioned a bridge on the river that connects the Stout grove with the campground and the beautiful views from the bridge. They weren’t kidding. By the time we got there, one of the rangers, Patricia, was already on the bridge and gave us another tip of some otters that were seen up the nearby creek. So we diverge further from our original trail and wander up the rocky shore of this creek. I at least have my hiking boots on. Lou on the other hand is wearing his usual sandals. I have no problem crossing a downed log across the rushing water of the creek. Lou avoids a near miss as his sandal loses traction, shredding the side of the log, but regains his balance to make it across safely. All for not. No otters could be seen and we didn’t feel like going any further. We still had to backtrack to the main river and back up to the Stout Grove loop trail.
Howland Hill road continues through more pristine redwood forest and at times narrows and winds between the trunks of massive coast redwoods. What a delight! The sunshine streamed down through the canopy to highlight the forest floor and ravines where more giants shot up to the sky. Soon this impressive display gives way to an ordinary conifer forest as the road leaves the Jedediah redwoods and we make our way back to Highway 101, just south of Crescent City. Back along the coast, the fog kept the temperatures about 10 degrees lower and made stopping at any of the vista points or scenic overlooks rather pointless. Continuing our return south on 101, we again drive through the Del Norte Redwoods state park. Back in the town of Klamath we notice many RV parks on both sides of the highway, the ones overlooking the Klamath River seemed nice with tremendous views, especially the Golden Bear and Klamath River RV parks. The stay in Trinidad was obviously too far from all the redwood parks. Klamath would have been a better locale to start off from.
Our last leg of our scenic drive tour went through the Prairie Creek Redwoods state park along Newman B. Drury Parkway. This is a well-paved two lane road that traverses the heart of another strand of gigantic redwoods and we travel south to the visitors center for yet more souvenirs and information. We find where the best places to see the Roosevelt Elk, second in size after the Moose. We had seen a “bagged” elk with an 8-point rack in the back of a pick-up back in Trinidad this morning and took a quick picture of it while it was parked across from the gas station we were at. Beautiful animals! Living is better, or course, but the day was getting late and the drive out to the coast through open meadowland to Fern Valley, another loop trail, was to be saved until tomorrow.
Continuing on toward Orick, we notice cars stopped at the side of the highway and people taking pictures of a bull elk in the front yard of someone’s house. Not wanting to trespass, we stay by the road and take our pictures as the elk lays down to rest under a tree, then scratches his backside ever so delicately with his massive rack. How cool! Further down the road, same thing. People on the side of the road, only this time it’s a herd of about 25 does, fawns and youths. One young buck already has a 5-point rack. Seems kind of small to be his harem. They’re browsing on a gravel bar on the Redwood Creek just on the northern outskirts of the town of Orick. They’re sighting just made our day and we celebrate in town with a piece of pie and milk at the Palm Café. It may be dinner time, but life is uncertain, so we have a dessert first.
21 miles more to the south and we’re back in Trinidad at our motor home to find more RVs have arrived. We did notice more RVs on the road today than we have on any other day since we started this latest adventure a week ago. This coastal area must be very popular with us “trailerites”. Our neighbors in the Itasca Sun Cruiser left on Sunday and we got new neighbors this evening. Emerald Forest has excellent cable and we’ve been able to catch up with the SF 49ers and Giants and we settled in for the night with another Giants game and some beef stroganoff courtesy of the Helping Hand.
