Redwood National and State Parks
Saturday 17 June - Monday 19 June, 2023
Trillium Falls.
We now have a Federal holiday to celebrate the end of the shameful practice of slavery in our country. While we are of course still coping with that legacy more than 150 years later, it's nice to recognize a major forward step in moral progress. For the three-day weekend, we headed up to Redwood National and State Parks. So close to the summer solstice, we did not do sunrise photography, but we did do some great hiking among the trees.
We drove up from the Bay Area Saturday, and discovered after a few hours that, while we had carefully packed peanut butter, jelly, and ice for the jelly, we had failed to pack the half loaf of Eric's homemade bread with which we had intended to make sandwiches. We stopped at the farmers' market in Arcata to get tortas for lunch, and purchased a loaf of bread. It was even more hippie than the farmers' market in Berkeley, with hula hooping, bubble blowing, drumming, and, of course, this being Humboldt, much pot smoking. Meanwhile, our catsitter Mimi very much enjoyed the bread we had left behind.
The obligatory park sign photo.
As Redwood is on the coast, there are beaches in addition to trees. We hiked down to Endert's Beach.
Arch at Endert's Beach.
Tall Trees Trail
For Sunday, we managed to secure an online reservation for the Tall Trees Grove. This got Mather out on a dirt road, which of course he loves, even though it was a very much a Prius-safe dirt road that didn't require his AWD or higher clearance.
The trail was enchanting.
Eric had me pose inside the burned-out base of a redwood.
A park volunteer came hiking down the trail, and of course we peppered him with questions about the region.
The volunteer pointed out this particular tree. He told us that the part in the front that looked dead was still drawing water that fed the rest of the tree.
Eric's photo looking up at the forest roof.
Eric photographed this oak tree reaching across the trail.
Redwood bark detail.
Cut end of a fallen redwood, in a curious shape.
Many ferns grow in the redwood forest.
Rhododendrons also grow in the redwood forest.
I saw this rhododendron flower gently fall and land on a fern.
Some sort of Buttercup near the creek.
I saw a very unnatural, but also very important, object along the trail.
We hiked out to this stream full of beautiful golden rocks.
The stream was an earthcache, where we learned about how the sedimentary rocks piling up in the stream turn into metamorphic rock over time. We found a rock in the transitional stages between sedimentary and metamorphic. You can see it starting to turn to marble within the sedimentary layers.
After the beautiful redwood forest, we went back to our room to regroup for a while, and then went out to find my 1,000th geocache, the virtual cache located at this covered bridge. Photo by Eric.
Our last stop for the day was iconic Stout Grove, readily accessible from the road. Photo by Eric.
Eric took my picture next to a dramatically long fallen redwood.
Map of Tall Trees Trail.
Trillium Falls Trail
We set out Monday morning on the Trillium Falls Trail to see a beautiful waterfall. Fairly early on in our hike, we missed a turn, and the going started to get very rough. We should have known enough to turn around, but apparently, having hiked up so many difficult trials like Mt. Dana, we have conditioned ourselves to precipitous, narrow trails with poor surfaces, overhanging foliage, and blockages.
So many other people had previously made this mistake that, even when we had to doff our packs to duck under this tree, we still didn't realize we were off the trail.
Eventually, we came to a point where, after hoisting myself over a fallen log on my belly, I could see nothing trail-like further beyond. Eric looked at the AllTrails .gpx file and figured out where we had erred, and we retraced our difficult steps until we returned to the actual trail.
Soon, we came to the beautiful falls nestled in the rocks, trees, and ferns. Photo by Eric.
I climbed down close to the falls for this dramatic shot.
Eric took my picture standing on the bridge in front of the falls.
After some careful consideration, we decided we had enough time to walk the long way around the trail rather than simply returning to Mather. We saw more beautiful redwoods.
These amazing redwood burls are part of the trees' reproductive cycle. Unfortunately, the park volunteer had told us, they are sometimes stolen or vandalized.
The Trillium for which the falls is named.
A different variety of Trillium.
I loved this Redwood Sorrel with wildly different colors on the top and bottom sides of its leaves.
We started out trying not to step on these caterpillars, but, as the trail went on, there were so many of them that it was impossible.
Robust Lancetooth Snail, a California endemic.
The trail had various benches with signs, and signs designating various groves for people who made donations, so we entirely failed to understand why the Park Service didn't see fit to put up a sign pointing out the inobvious bend in the trial that we had missed.
We liked this bench sign that one husband had dedicated to his husband.
As we proceeded down the trail, we met Elli, who came from Brooklyn and knew some places where Eric had visited and worked in his teenage years. She was very lively and charming, and we hiked the rest of the way back to the parking lot together, talking about our travels. She was taking a year off work to explore national parks. As she was in the middle of her journey, we had a lot of information about parks she hadn't been to yet.
Eric set up a picture of us with Elli and her Prius.
Map of Trillium Falls Trail.
On the way home, we stopped to have a very late lunch with our friend Julia in Eureka. Eric photographed a realistic Eureka mural.
I got to try a Humboldt County special other than the usual product--a mustard and dill condiment called Larrupin.
Map of our Redwood journey.
This was a nice little getaway weekend with opportunties for lovely hiking and photography. Because they are close to the coastal fog, these woods have been less vulnerable to fire than woods further inland. So much effort has been required to save them, I hope they are able to continue to thrive.