We very much enjoyed our visit to the Oregon Coast this summer, but it is time to head towards Yuma. We spent a few days in Klamath, California to visit Redwood National Park.
This was the 40th National Park we've been to. If you count the St. Louis Arch and Indiana Dunes, which were both not National Parks when we visited, that would be 42. There are a total of 63 of them, but several are in remote Alaska, Virgin Islands, American Samoa and other islands. We hope to visit about 10 more of them in the future.
In 1994 the National Park Service and California State Parks agreed to cooperatively manage their combined 133,000 acres of Redwood forests. It is a World Heritage Site. When logging began in 1850, roughly two million acres of old-growth coast redwood forests were in the coastal mountains of California. Today, just 5 percent remain; 35 percent of that being in the combined state and national parks. How sad! Public and private conservation organizations are working hard to preserve what is there, and help the newer trees grow in a healthy environment.
We hiked a short distance to the Big Tree Wayside to see the 13th tallest tree in the park. It is 286 feet tall, 23.7 feet in diameter, 74.5 feet in circumference and about 1500 years old. In order to get the entire tree into the picture, you have to stoop down and take it from below. This makes us look taller than we are. It's impossible to get the amazing size and scope of these trees in a photo!
Redwoods are the tallest trees in the world. The tallest known Redwood is in the national park, and is called Hyperion measuring 380.3 feet tall. It's exact location is kept secret to protect it from tourists.
Here are some of the others we saw on our hike. Enjoy their beauty and majesty!!
There are three species of redwood trees. The Dawn Redwood grow in China. The Giant Sequoia (which we saw in July) grow on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in Central California. The tallest in the world Coast Redwoods grow along the Northern California coast and into southernmost coastal Oregon.
It is often amazing to me how hard nature works to survive. This tree is growing out of a dead log, and seems to be doing quite well. Look closely for the roots all over the log (click to enlarge photo).
We started our day in the parks driving to Fern Canyon. That was quite the adventure!!
On the way there, we drove past Elk Meadow. These guys were having a rest. I counted about 15 females and young ones, and one Big Daddy!! He was looking out for his harem. These were Roosevelt Elk, a subspecies of North American elk. We saw Rocky Mountain Elk when we were in Estes Park, Colorado in 2010.
You can only access the canyon with a free online permit. I signed us up for the 8 am to 12 noon time slot. The dirt road to the canyon is 8 miles of bumpy, narrow, and winding torture; including crossing three shallow creeks! We made it to the check-in kiosk, but no one was there to check our permit or look at our National Parks Pass. Oh well, onward. We got to the small canyon parking lot and headed to the roughly 2 mile hike into the canyon. Parts of Jurassic Park was filmed in this location. I liked the sun shining between these trees.
The first part of the hike took us up to the top of the canyon. Then we came back down to the river flowing through it. We had been warned our shoes would get wet. They weren't kidding. There were logs and boards to cross over in some spots. Unless you're an acrobat, the logs were not easy to traverse. Since my shoes were going to get wet anyway, I walked in the river a lot of the way. I'd rather have wet feet than broken bones!!
The seven types of ferns growing along the 50 foot canyon walls were huge and awesome to see. To be honest, based on the road required to get there and the difficulty of the hike; I really wouldn't recommend this spot especially with a car. We saw plenty of cars; but I was sure glad we had a big truck.
Here's one of the obstacles we climbed over.
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| Kevin carefully picking his way across |
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| A banana slug on the trail. Kevin's foot is for size comparison. |
While in Klamath, we stayed at the Klamath River RV Park. It is situated right along the river with beautiful views. We really enjoyed this park. It was very well taken care of. You could tell the owners cared. That makes such a HUGE difference!!
The fog in the picture below is where the river meets the ocean. All along the coast in Oregon and northern California, it was almost always foggy at the ocean.
One of the local tourist attractions had these huge statues of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox in their parking lot. I had always thought these characters were from the Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin areas. I guess if it attracts tourists, it works here, too. Paul is 49 feet tall, weights 30,000 pounds. The concrete base alone weighs 800,000 pounds. His axe is 27 feet long, and his boots are 10 feet high. That means the boots alone are as tall as a one story building. Babe is 35 feet tall and also weighs 30,000 pounds. You can see the people in the picture aren't even as tall as the base of Paul.
This bridge across the Klamath River has these bear statues on all four corners. I thought they were pretty cool.
One day we drove up to Crescent City and Crescent Beach. I had read that there are lots of sand dollars to be found at the beach. I found several. Here is what they look like when they are still alive. The ones I found are white, bleached by the sun. I plan to preserve them when we get home. We also stopped at the Port O'Pints Brewing Company so Kevin could have some fun, too. He's not much of a beach person.
On our last afternoon in Klamath, we went on the 2 hour Klamath River Jet Boat Tour.
The boat took us about 22 miles up the river. About 6 times, the captain spun us in a 360 degree turn. It was so much fun. I found this picture online to show you what it was like. I was too busy holding on to take a photo!
Along the way, the captain would stop and show us some of the wildlife and explain some of the history of the area. These are double-crested cormorants.
We went to the estuary where the river meets the ocean. These pelicans and seagulls were hanging out on a sandbar. You can see how foggy it is. As soon as we got inland, the fog disappeared and we had a beautiful sunny trip.
We saw a pretty large black bear running along the steep bank. I was surprised a bear could run on such a steep area. This is where we saw him. I wasn't fast enough to actually get his picture.
We saw a couple of Bald Eagles and one of their nests.
The scenery along the way was fantastic. For the first few miles, we saw several fish camps along the shores. After that, there are no roads to access the river, so it was just pristine wild river and land.
Here's the RV park we're staying at from the boat.
We've enjoyed our summer so far. I know Kevin will be happy to be out of the winding, mountainous roads. Tomorrow we head to Lake Tahoe for a few days. That should require one more trip over the mountains, and then we'll be headed back to the flat desert. We plan to be back in Yuma a week from tomorrow.
Don’t wish upon a star – Reach for one!
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