Adventure Travel Photography Blog
We awoke to rain that continued most of the day. Lucky for me, I had planned for little hiking today…mostly scenic driving and some blogging. We followed Newton B. Drury Scenic Parkway until we connected with Route 101 where we continued north until we reached the Klamath River.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
I’m not sure why I keep hoping for better weather. I’m in the Pacific Northwest during the rainy season. I think I just associate California with the sunny beaches of the southern half. Regardless, the weather was somewhat reasonable today. I started the morning taking the hottest shower of my life. Those that know me, know that my tolerance for heat is super high, so for me to say the shower was hot, is like saying boiling water was flowing from the spigot. At least I was clean briefly.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
Wow. I stayed up way too late in the K-Mart parking lot blogging and taking advantage of 3G service, and I’m paying for it today…feeling a bit sluggish. I saw all the redwoods I could handle yesterday, so I opted for a change of pace today. First, in dire need of coffee, I utilized the “Around Me” application on my iPhone to find a local place. The Boat House Expresso Bar, located on the harbor, sounded good to me. As soon as I hopped out of VANilla, a nice lady greeted me and said, “I’m sorry, we’re closed right now…doing a little remodeling and painting.”
“Oh, too bad, I was just looking for a cup of coffee,” I replied.
“I have some coffee brewed, but I can’t make you anything fancy,” she responded.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
I started today out joining the tourists and driving through a redwood tree…well, I was told VANilla wouldn’t fit, so I had to drive around the redwood tree. Regardless, I’d call the “Drive-thru Tree” a tourist trap and a waste of five bucks! Perhaps that was because during my recent trip to Africa we got to drive through a tree in the wilderness and take as many pictures as we wanted without dodging the next car coming through.
The Chandelier Redwood Tree stood 315 feet high, is approximately 2,400 years old, and has a diameter of 21 feet. A chandelier tree is a tree whose branches become injured or bent and upon continuing to grow, the branches attempt to correct the odd angle by growing upward. After driving through the tree, tourists could visit the gift shop and even purchase a redwood (twig size) for $9.95. A few tourist traps I didn’t visit were Confusion Hill and Legend of Big Foot.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
My day began with a hot shower, tea, coffee, and a soft-boiled egg and bacon sandwich courtesy of Tish and Chris! After Tish left for work, Chris and I took the dogs, Simon, Petey, and Chili down to Anchor Bay Beach. It is one of the few places around that not only lets dogs visit the beach, but they may also run off leash. Several locals frequent the area. In fact, approximately 30 different families banded together to outbid Marriott in order to save the campground where many of them have been coming with their families for years!
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
Petey and I survived the evening on the street and followed the Russian River back to Highway 1 where we stopped at an overlook near Jenner. Here, I met John who recently returned to the mainland after spending the last seven years in the U.S. Virgin Islands working on cabinetry for yachts. He had a large telescope on a tripod and a clipboard on the hood of his car. I asked what he was recording and he replied the type and numbers of seals in the channel below. The volunteer organization was studying the effects on the seals from dredging the channel for the salmon. After chatting for a while, he had to get back to counting and I had to move on.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
I started out the day visiting Point Reyes National Seashore, located on the edge of the San Andreas Fault. This enormous area was originally inhabited by the Miwoks. Francis Drake arrived in the area around 1579, Sebastian Rodriguez Cermeno’s ship wrecked here in 1595, and finally Don Sabastian Vizcaino gave Point Reyes its name in 1603.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
We got a late start to the morning, leaving Nicole’s around 9. Now that I understand how remote Highway 1 can be, I loaded up at Safeway and the Shell Station before driving across the city to the Golden Gate Bridge in a light drizzle. The bridge was visible once I got on it!
The Reader’s Digest book called for visiting the Marin Headlands on the north side of the bridge and Muir Woods National Monument. I had previously visited both places on a sunny day during a time when it wasn’t National Parks Week which provides free entrance to the masses. I found two full parking lots and cars parked on the side of the road as far as I could see, so I continued north to visit some less popular areas, especially since the tops of the trees were blanketed in fog.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
I spent the day in San Francisco with Nicole and catching up with old college friends. We met my friend Beth from college to walk the Lands End Trail which offered a beautiful ocean view. Had it been a clear day, the view would have also included the Golden Gate Bridge and the Marin Headlands. None the less, it was still magnificent. It was hard to believe such remote beauty stood just on the edge of an enormous city.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!
With Highway 1 being closed down fifteen miles below Carmel, we had to turn south and leave Big Sur via Nacimiento-Fergusson Road. The road is actually a stop in the Reader’s Digest book and is described as, “this paved 25-mile byway – a white knuckle side trip with hairpin curves and panoramic views – traverses the Santa Lucia Range and ends at an army base.” It was very clear that landslides had recently been cleared from the area and the road, like Highway 1 has a few chunks missing from it.
ON THE ROAD AGAIN!