Our next detour was the Avenue of the Giants in Humboldt State Park. The Avenue of the Giants is a 30-mile drive that wanders in and out of patchy old-growth redwood groves. Whereas Chandelier tree was one lone giant, we now found ourselves looking at big clusters of giant trees and it was even more amazing.
Our campsite was further up the coast, almost in Oregon. I had read that the coastal redwood forests are better the farther North you go, but I had no idea what this meant until Chris and I took a 13 mile hike through the heart of an old-growth forest near our campsite. Within a mile of hiking we were surrounded by huge, ancient trees for as far as the eye could see. The forest floor was covered with dense, green ferns. The sunlight, when it wasn't shrouded by fog, would dapple the dark forest in scattered bright spots. Now we were seeing the real coastal redwoods! To stand among these ancient trees, these giant structures of nature, and listen to the silence of the forest was the most amazing and indescribable thing I experienced on our trip.
See if you can spot Chris in this next picture!
I also enjoyed looking at the remains of fallen trees that littered the forest floor. I could only imagine what it would be like to see one of these giant trees fall.
Our hike led us to a remote and secluded beach that was just as indescribable as the giant trees we walked through to get there. Behind us were forest covered bluffs lining a strip of low lying land covered in little hills and golden grasses.
The grasses and hills slowly faded out, giving way to a smooth beach of dark, coarse sand.
As we sat on the sand and ate our lunch, we watched a couple of seals play in the big waves crashing on the shore. If that wasn't enough, we were privileged to have this time to ourselves. No longer were we sharing the beach with hundreds of beach-goers like we did in Santa Monica or San Diego. We were completely alone!
The return trip on the hike took us through Fern Canyon, which is exactly what the name implies. On the return trip we also spotted a few Banana Slugs and a wild elk.
We almost ran out of daylight before we got back to our campsite. The threat of bears motivated me to set a leg burning pace during the final miles. The hike was exhausting. The hike was also an amazing change of scenery. Gone were the busy, crowded cities. We were now enjoying the quietness and solitude of God's greatest creations.As a side note, we did make it to Oregon. Driving from Lubbock to San Diego and then up the entire California coast was about 2,500 miles of scenery. Wow!
We also saw this large replica of Paul Bunyan and his blue ox Babe while in the redwoods. I suppose this giant legend would have come from giant trees like the California Coastal Redwoods.
Paul Bunyan also moved his head and talked, kind of like Big Tex, only his voice was kind of high-pitched. Chris made a joke about expecting Paul Bunyan to sound a bit manlier and I said that maybe this was pre-pubescent Paul Bunyan. Then we set up for our picture and afterwards Paul Bunyan said, "Did you see that I winked for your picture." That's when we realized that the voice was "live" and that he probably heard our jokes about his voice. Opps!
As I was driving out of the redwoods toward our next destination, Chris looked at our pictures on our camera. I heard him say "That's amazing." I said something like, " Yea, those trees were amazing." And although he would agree that the trees were amazing, he was actually looking at this "amazing cantilever" that he spotted one day while we were driving.
He's a true architect.
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