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| Helen and a couple of Redwood friends |
On the way to Crescent City we travelled down the Redwood Highway, so named for obvious reasons. Just when you think you’ve seen all the great sites another pops up to capture your attention – namely the stately redwood trees. The drive itself was a challenge of concentration as the road wound through steep-sided valleys covered with pine trees of various types on an ever downward spiral towards sea level. The scenery was just breath-taking. We made a number of photo stops but a still photo hardly does justice. I think a 360 degree roof mounted camera (a la Google) might have done the job.
The major attraction for the day was a visit to Stout Grove, a large cluster of old growth redwood trees. Normally these can be reached by a short walk across a bridge over the nearby Smith River. However National Parks remove the bridge after the Labor Day weekend (early September) to prevent it being damaged by flooding from the torrential rain which can occur. We had to drive down a narrow road and walk about a kilometre to gain access to the grove and the trail which winds through it.
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| The redwood tunnel - lights on please! |
Words fail to adequately describe these trees and their size. No single photo can encompass a complete tree so we had to be satisfied with “bits and pieces”. I took a movie of a tree in the hope that it might convey an impression of their immense size and some comparative size photos with Helen as the “reference point”. The tallest tree in the grove is the height of a 35 storey building! Just massive.
Towards evening the sea fog rolled in and by the time we had finished dinner it was difficult to see more than 20m ahead. We saw both seals and sea lions in the harbour although getting a good photo in the conditions was near impossible.
