John and Jean: Redwoods State and National Parks

After we finished up in Medford yesterday, we headed west on I-5 to Grants Pass and then caught 199, The Redwoods Highway down to Crescent City, CA. Stopped at the Park Visitor's Center there to see what campgrounds were open etc. Then headed down into the Park(s). Turns out Redwoods is a cooperative management effort of the NPS and the CA Dept of Parks and Rec that includes Redwood National Park, Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park and Prairie creek Redwoods State Park. It's in a large block on the north near the boarder and then a thin strip along the coast down to Prairie Creek and then the NP section below that. Unfortunately, all the campgrounds are in the State Parks - $35 a night! Yikes! We'd spent $6 the night before for a bigger area. Ah, well. Got the tent set up at Prairie Creek and then headed for a drive out Davison Rd. to see if we could find any elk. Saw a few at a distance. Decided to head on down the road to Gold Bluffs Beach and maybe the Fern Canyon. It was a bumpy road but through huge redwood trees and wonderful ferns. We decided to walk out to the Fern Canyon trail but found it involved creek crossings on rocks and logs that didn't meet my standards. Wandered in a little ways but too wet. As we were walking back we saw a bunch of bridges back in a storage area....the season has closed here. We ran into a couple also trying to do the Canyon named John and Jeanne. Couldn't remember ever meeting another John and Jeanne. Turns out they were camped right across the road from us. Had a nice conversation. Had a nice dinner on the beach and waited to see what the sun would do--no clouds so pretty uneventful.

Chapter 2 of the mouse story. John got the traps and set 2 with peanut butter. Went to the bathroom and returned and Gotcha! Mouse 1. Decided to reset that trap in case there was more than 1. Too bad, he was a cute little gray guy. :-(

This morning we got up to a dry tent :-) and sunny skies and 2 more mice! Broke camp and headed into the National Park to walk through the Lady Bird Johnson Grove. As we were going down the road we came upon a herd of elk with this guy as the Bull Elk. It's almost time for the rut and he was bothering those little ladies! Thought his neckwear was stylish.

Further down the road we came to the trail through the grove. Beautiful. Huge trees up and around. (pardon the underline--can't figure out how to get rid of it). It was a delightful mile and a half walk through the early morning forest. Not much bird activity, though we have found that pretty much everywhere we have gone.

Once we finished our walk through the Grove we decided to head back to Oregon and begin our journey up the coast. One redwood tree begins to look like another. It was beautiful though. We headed back up toward Crescent City and then onto 101 up the coast. Oregon has their traveling public act together and have a Mile by Mile booklet for the Coast. It's WONDERFUL. Has all the campgrounds, sites to see, and a Biker Map we picked up has all the scenic routes around the bigger cities. It's going to be fun! Spending tonight at Harris Beach State Park with the thunder of the waves crashing against the rocks to lull us to sleep. Here are a few shots we took on the drive up here.