Our RV Adventures

We started off our last day in Klamath, CA with breakfast at the Klamath River Cafe just like yesterday.

I had the eggs, bacon, and 3 pancakes. The pancakes were so large that I could only eat one.

After breakfast we stopped by the Post Office to mail off some packages, but since it was Saturday, it was closed. In small towns, apparently, the PO doesn’t open at all on Saturdays.

Then it was on to the Tour-Thru Tree, one of several drive-thru redwood trees in the area. This tree is still alive and still growing.

I remember driving thru a Sequoia when my family came out west on vacation back in 1964 when I was 15. When I checked it out this time, I found that it collapsed in 1969 due to heavy snowfall. The only remaining drive-thru trees are now all Redwoods.

Next, heading up the road to the Trees of Mystery place that we had seen the day before, we encountered another of the many of these signs we had seen. What’s kind of scary is that this road is about 300 feet about sea level. I don’t want to be anywhere near here when a 300 foot tsunami come through.

 
A few miles down the road we arrived at Trees of Mystery and got parked.

 
We bought our tickets and headed up the 1/2 mile trail to the beginning of the Sky Trail gondola ride.

This is the Family Tree, twelve trees growing out of one trunk.

This tree has a hollowed-out passageway underneath it.

 
This is Fallen Giant, a 320 foot tree that fell about 500 years ago.

 
More tall trees than you can imagine.

 
The Cathedral Tree, a ring of 9 trees, is often used for weddings and other ceremonies.

 
This is the Brotherhood Tree, 297 feet tall and 19 feet in diameter.

 

After a pretty steep climb, we reached the beginning of the Sky Trail and headed up the side of the mountain.

 
Getting to the top, we found a family of chipmunks living underneath the Sky Trail upper terminal. I think this was Jan’s favorite part. They were running everywhere.

The view from the top was really something.

 
Then it was time for the ride back down. I had to search Jan to be sure she wasn’t smuggling any chipmunks back down.

Starting the trail back down we saw the Towering Inferno, a tree that was stuck by lightning in December 1995. It was originally over 250 feet tall and about 1200 years old. It burned for several days and this husk is all that’s left.

 

 
The bottom part of the trail was thru the Trail of Tall Tales, consisting of large scale carvings telling stories of Paul Bunyan and his friends.

 

Back in the parking lot we checked out the large statues of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox.

Funny, but I always thought Babe was a girl.

 
Jan thinks he’s a guy !

 
Leaving Trees of Mystery we headed down the road and out to Requa Point to do some whale watching. The brochures said we could see whales off the point here from mid-April thru May.

How many did we see?

None.

But we did find this plaque. When I first read it, I thought the human food they were referring to was US.

 
Leaving Requa Point we headed south about 95 miles to drive the Avenue of the Giants. This is a 31 mile stretch of old US 101 that threads thru some really tall trees.

 

 

Next we headed about about 25 miles further south and made the misinformed decision to make the 21 mile drive out to Shelter Cove where we were absolutely, positively guaranteed to see whales. What we didn’t know that this 21 mile drive would be the steepest, twistyest drive we’ve encountered since we drove up Mt Washington in New Hampshire last year. The 21 miles took us almost an hour and a half.

Of course it would all be worth it when we saw the whales.

NOT!

We saw some beautiful scenery, but nary a whale was in sight.

 

 

 

And, of course, we still had the 21 mile, hour and a half, drive back.

And then, of course, the 120 mile drive back home.

Coming back from Shelter Cove, we did see a lot of deer feeding along the road.

Getting into Eureka about 6:30 pm we stopped at a Marie Callender’s for dinner, and a couple of pieces of pie to take home with us.

Coming thru Trinidad, (no, not that one) we encountered what we had seen on a local billboard. The largest herd of Roosevelt Elk in the world crossing the road in front of us.

This YouTube video shows what it looked like.

Finally, about 8:30 pm we got back home after a long day, and over 250 miles.

Tomorrow we travel about 160 miles north to Coos Bay, OR for a couple of days.

More then…

Today we headed out about 9 am to drive around the Redwood National Forest area. We first came across the Tour Thru Tree, one of several trees that allowed you to drive your vehicle thru them. We decided to check it out later and kept moving.

Next we came to the town of Klamath and stopped for breakfast at the Klamath River Cafe. It turned out to be very good with really good coffee.

Then, heading north on US 101 we saw the place we’d been seeing signs for – Trees of Mystery, apparently the home of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox.

They have a gondola sky ride above the trees, a trail thru the trees, and some other things. Another thing for a later visit.

We headed on up the road to Crescent City to scope out the place and do the Walmart thing.  Coming back I stopped for gas and we headed back toward Klamath.

Seeing a sign for a coast trail we took a turn down the road and headed toward the ocean. The first thing we came across was a large herd of Elk just off the road, just laying around catching some rays.

  

Following the road along thru the forest we came across a lot of fog in the trees.

Coming back past the rig we dropped off our groceries and headed back out  to make a Coastal Drive thru the Redwood National Park that we found out about in some brochures.

And it was a great drive. Most of the road was a narrow one-lane gravel road winding thru the trees right along the Pacific coast.

And we finally got a close up look at  some big trees.

 

We got back to the rig about 3 pm and were in for the night.

A while later Jan cooked up a batch of her great Chicken Rice-A-Roni, along with some garlic French bread. For dessert we had some fresh cherries we got at a road side stand today.

Tomorrow we’re going to check out the Tour-thru Tree and the Trees of Mystery, and then drive back down south to the Avenue of the Giants for more big trees.