Up The Road (http://new-wp.uptheroad.org/?tag=redwoods)
Following Hwy. 1 north from Mendocino County leads to Leggett and the junction with Hwy. 101. The big attraction here is the Drive-Thru-Tree Park, as schlocky as it sounds, but for some reason we humans just love driving through trees. They carved this car-sized hole in the Chandelier Tree in the 1930s, and for a fee you can “drive thru” it, or bike or walk (RVs won’t make it). Continue Reading →
Dust off the backpack, get new laces for those hiking boots. This is the place. California’s isolated “Lost Coast”—virtually uninhabited and more remote than any other stretch of coastline in the Lower 48—has been found. Here steep mountains soar like bald eagles, their domes tufted with chaparral, a few redwoods tucked behind the ears, and sink their rock-knuckled, grassy talons into surf that surges onto black-sand beaches. Local people, of course, snort over the very idea that this splendid stretch of unfriendly coast was ever lost in the first place, even if area highways were intentionally routed away from it. They knew it was here. Continue Reading →
It’s not as if there are no redwoods before you get to Humboldt and Del Norte Counties. Stranded stands of coast redwoods can be found along the Central Coast, in protected, wetter areas as far as the southernmost reaches of Big Sur. But here, along the North Coast, is where the tribe truly thrives. They once numbered an estimated two million, but even here the native population of coastal redwood trees has been reduced through logging and agricultural clearing to isolated groves of virgin trees. (more…) Continue Reading →
The Gualala River forms the boundary between Sonoma and Mendocino Counties. Travelers heading north will find that most Bay Area weekenders have by now tailed off, leaving this stretch of coast highway for the locals and long-haul travelers. It’s a little greener (and wetter) here than in Sonoma County, but the crescent coves and pocket beaches you appreciated along the wild Sonoma Coast continue north across the county line, one after the next, like a string of pearls. (more…) Continue Reading →