Down the Coast III: Up the Coast

The last leg of our trip took us north from Elk (or is it Greenwood?) and up through more awesome redwoods.

Our first stop was Humboldt Redwoods State Park. Great trees there, and a great interpretive trail.

Deeply moving.

And these tree! This one is doing just fine a hundred or so feet up, despite this damage down below:


Here's what was once the world's tallest tree:

The Dyerville Giant, "at one time the tallest tree in the world, which fell in 1991 and now provides nutrients to the next generation of trees in the forest," according to the Park's website.

Did I already mention that this place is deeply moving?

For the sake of scale, I'm standing near the crown, Emily's shooting from the roots:

Can't spot me? Try this blow-up.

Current champion Coast Redwood:


From there we went through Eureka again, and enjoyed a nice meal at the Brick & Fire Bistro.

You know what, speaking of food, I forgot to mention something about Elk: while we were there we had the best meal of the whole trip, at the Greenwood Pier Cafe. Delicious.

I seriously am going to have to get back down to Elk again soon!

Anyway, next day we did a lovely hike in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park (also pictured at the top of this post).


Here's a little video of the route, recommended by a ranger. Prairie Creek Trail, Zigzag #1, and West Ridge Trail:


Now this is a few trees that have fused together, so it's maybe not crazy as it looks.

Still pretty crazy though!

Fused together? Yes, one of the many wild things about redwoods you can read about in this excellent New Yorker piece from '05. Not a subscriber? I hate to encourage this sort of thing, but I noticed a site that posted the story & is trying to claim "fair use"...

Anyway, great read. Hundreds of trunks on the top of one tree? Animals that live their whole lives hundreds of feet above the ground? Trees growing in soil that's formed in the crowns of other trees? Yes. Good stuff.

Okay, where were we?
Oh, speaking of, here's a map of the spots in this post:

View Down the Coast III in a larger map

As you can see, our next stop was Eugene, where we stayed at the lovely C'est la Vie Inn:


From there we were on the way home, though we couldn't resist stopping in Portland.

Great Japanese garden. But how did they get the address japanesegarden.com? I mean, that is impressive!


Really liked the rock garden:




Last stop: Ali Baba's food cart. Yum!


And then we were home. Which isn't such a bad thing either.