Posted by Karen on 15-May-2010
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After enjoying all the wood carvings and kissing the bear, Pauline and I took a left turn and headed towards the Sinkyone Wilderness State Park and the coast. Sinkyone is one of the most remote state parks I’ve visited; to reach the north entrance of the park you traverse through the mountains of the King Range Conservation area and the last 3.5 miles are a narrow, winding pot-hole-filled dirt road. Pauline was a trooper and didn’t show any nervousness peering down the steep embankments on her side of the SUV, but she did show excitement when she spotted the heard of Roosevelt Elk below us. We arrive at the visitor center and after a nice chat with the park hosts, we enjoy lunch in the barn protected from the ocean breeze. Afterwards, we continued along the coast road and when it ended, we hiked down to Bear Harbor, a tiny black sands beach that’s very pretty. We explored it for awhile, enjoyed talking with some folks that were camping out there and then as we were leaving, Pauline, said get ready to take the picture when I fall into the water while crossing this creek to get back out… I had the camera aimed, but she never fell, handled the log hopping like a pro actually! On the way out, we took the road past Shelter Cove to see the lighthouse and then it was back across the mountain to our campsite.
Posted by Karen on
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This morning, we spent some more time on the Avenue of the Giants and we inspected the One Log House (bigger than my travel trailer with more decoration), stood beneath the Grandfather Tree (way way beneath that tall dude) and mulled the Legend of Bigfoot (I’m not going to tell him he doesn’t exist). And there were lots and lots of chainsaw wood carvings to be admired.
Posted by Karen on 14-May-2010
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We arrived last night and set up camp at Richardson Grove Campground and RV Park, just a bit south of Garberville. This is Pauline’s first trip to Redwood Country, so we decided to do the typical tourist thing and drive through the Avenue of the Giants. Richardson Grove State Park was our first stop where we watched the movie at the visitor center and then walked along the interpretation path. The Living Chimney Tree was our next stop and Pauline walked inside her first redwood tree and this would become a theme throughout the weekend. They also have a Hobbit Town, but it was closed and seemed to not be operated anymore. After a leisurely lunch in Miranda, we went to the Shrine Drive Thru Tree. We didn’t pay to drive my SUV through, but we watched someone else go through and then enjoyed the carved tree houses. Our last stop of the day was at the Founder’s Grove to see the Dyerville Giant, a huge old redwood tree that has fallen and you can see it’s huge root structure.
Posted by Karen on 13-May-2010
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Pauline and I are one our way up to Redwood Country for a few days under the tall trees. We took our lunch break at the Lucerne Harbor on Clear Lake and enjoyed watching the ducks paddle around for awhile before continuing on up down the road.
