Day 9 - Redwood National Park

Thursday, June 14, 2007

We started the day with an hour-long drive up to Redwoods National Park. This is an amazingly lush forest, especially compared to the Southern California photos I’m used to. There’s so much moisture in the air, which is key to these trees’ habitat. Like the Sequoias, these trees are strikingly big. We did a 2.5 mile hike through one of the groves, and found a dead tree that was somehow hollowed out all the way to the top, like looking up into a chimney. Also, at the trailhead, we saw about ten elk. These things are huge! Males weigh up to 1000 lbs., according to the rangers we spoke to, who were infinitely more helpful than the Yosemite backcountry rangers.

After driving north to the town of Klamath, we stopped at a privately owned redwood grove that was a little too touristified for my taste. The highlight, however, was a cable car ride to an ~800’ summit overlooking the ocean and the forest. “Neat” is probably the right word to describe it. Exiting the park, we passed some nice coastal scenery, with craggy rocks jutting up from the waves.

I’ve been traveling in California for nine days; but, today we finally entered Oregon. We stopped in Medford for dinner, which was an utter disaster. First, we tried Abby’s pizza. The pizza was totally wrong and equally disgusting. Next, we stopped at some fish restaurant, where the manager told us they had plenty of vegetarian dishes. Of course, what he meant was that they would take the meat out of any of the pasta dishes on the menu. This was nothing compared to what was to come. At a Denny’s clone called Shari’s, I ordered some kind of Western BBQ burger, with a garden patty substituted for the beef. Of course, I guess I should’ve also mentioned I didn’t really need the three strips of bacon on top of it! I mean, why would you put bacon on a veggie burger? Why!?

I’ll be glad to brush the Medford dust off my feet tomorrow morning when we head up to Crater Lake. I’ve been looking forward to this park for a while, so hopefully it’ll live up to what I have pictured.