Of Giants, Yokels, and Melted Shoes

Well, we are now nine days into our trip and probably just about halfway down the coast. As of this morning, we'd taken some 1,500 photos and, according to the trip-odometer, driven 1,252 miles. Our route thus far looks something like this:

Definitely a long and winding road, on and off the coast. We've been able to see virtually everything we set out to visit so far, including our most recent jaunt with Sequoia sempervirens, the Coast Redwood. If the Douglas Firs of Oregon were a gathering of Ents, then the Coast Redwoods are the Saruman's Tower of Orthanc at Isengard. In other words, they're really friggin big; like bigger than you're thinking. Big like when you see the first tree that's 20 feet in diameter, your brain can't process it. And when you finally get to walk amongst them, it feels like you're stuck in a strange, natural, optical illusion. It's not the height that gets you. The tops of the trees are too far away to gain any appreciation for how tall they are. It's the girth, the shear mass of these organisms that blows you away. They make you feel very miniscule and insignificant at our current position in space-time. And apparently, the Giant Sequoias in Yosemite get up to twice the diameter. Yep, that's right, 40 feet wide. As in... a house could fit inside it. (We'll be seeing them in a few days.)

There's really no way to explain the experience of standing at the foot of one of these hulking monsters of a tree. Pictures are a very poor representation. And we've all seen the cheesey photos tourists take of themselves, for scale, standing at the base of one of these trees, a big dumb smile on their face, or an expression of pure amazement at the sheer awesomeness of mother nature’s handiwork... perhaps a sweet thumbs-up to top it off , demonstrating their overwhelming approval. Well, we wouldn't want to disappoint, so here are some of us from Wednesday:



Sarah, seeing how totally cool I looked hugging that Douglas Fir, could not resist showing me up by hugging a much bigger tree:


As we wandered through these ancient botanical behemoths, we had a spare moment to set up a timer shot of both of us, so we indulged ourselves:


Here’s what the above photo would look like if Bigfoot happened to run by behind the camera just before the shutter opened:


Actually, just after setting the camera timer and rushing to Sarah’s side for the picture, we heard an ominous creaking noise from the boughs hundreds of feet above our heads. Obviously at this point, we didn't have our heads crushed by the falling limb, but it certainly gave us a momentary pause as we apprehensively watched it crash through the tiers of needled branches over the course of a full five seconds or so.

Over the last three days, we were able to check out a handful of other redwood groves throughout the parks along the coast, but the coolest, most secluded spot we found was here, in case anyone ever happens to be in the area:

On Wednesday evening, we arrived at the Jedediah Smith State Park to get a campsite, but we were denied. Sites in the redwoods are in high demand all summer long, I suppose, so we tried a couple other spots and settled on the Florence Keller County Park just a couple miles outside Jed Smith. This place ended up being our first (and only so far) questionable camping spot. The facilities weren’t terrible, but let’s just say they left something to be desired… like, for instance, a lack of flies and mosquitoes continuously buzzing around either of the two toilets on the premises.

More unnerving, however, was the group at the site adjacent to our own, who were boisterously drunk and gave out that Deliverance vibe boasts of loaded firearms in the back of the pickup and a family tree with fewer branches than the accepted norm. I probably shouldn’t judge, but let’s just say they made us uncomfortable. And though they never did try to assail us or coerce us into some weird yokel sacrament, at the very least, they did annoy us by blaring Shania Twain from their truck’s stereo just before we were turning in for the night. The situation worsened when the CD began to skip repulsively, the only upside being that the song ended that much quicker (but not before Shania stuttered on for a good minute and a half).

Sarah wasn’t thrilled with these accommodations, but we assured ourselves that it was only for a night; assuming we weren’t throttled in our sleep, no damage done. So we harnessed our chi and sat by the fire, tuning out the music, thinking “Serenity now… serenity now…” and silently reading our books. Suddenly, Sarah yelled out, “My shoe’s on fire!” and yanked back her right foot from the smoldering coals as the toe poured black smoke, exuding a tang of scorched rubber. I grabbed our water jug and doused the tip of her Keen hiking sandal, which had been burnt practically right through. Sarah was inconsolable for a bit, recounting how she had just been saying that day how she loved her new Keens so much, how they were so perfect for our trip, how she’d have them forever. Unconvincingly, I tried to stifle my laughter at the obvious hilarity of someone burning a hole through their shoe by a campfire (the camping equivalent of the proverbial “Man getting hit in crotch by football”), but somehow, Sarah couldn’t find the humor in it. Here is the aftermath:


Luckily, the burn hole didn’t look nearly as dire in the daylight and is really completely invisible from the top of the shoe. So, while Sarah’s Keens may not last forever, it appears they will remain functional for the foreseeable future. She was able to put them to the test yesterday, as we worked our way from Jed Smith, past Crescent Beach and on towards Humboldt County. They passed.

We stopped numerous times along the drive to check out the scenery, which included rocky cliffs, dark sand beaches, tide pools, sunbathing seals, grazing elk, more redwoods, and the hippiest of hippy shops in a coastal village called Trinidad. At the tiny Beachcomber Café, they are pretty hardcore… to the point where some of the people there definitely smelled like hippies. When a customer asked if she could have her coffee in a to-go cup, they politely informed her that they don’t use them, but that if she’d be in town for a bit, she was welcome to take one of their loaner mugs, many of which looked like they were “ready to go on a field trip”. I got lox on a garlic bagel, and Sarah got a roasted beat, local chevre, and walnut Panini, on which the lettuce turned out to be the actual beat greens. I tried a bite, and the beats still tasted like dirt to me, but Sarah said it was fantastic. Besides coffee, tea, soups, salads and sandwiches, they also sold Beachcomber Café T-shirts that sported a picture of the Earth, under which it read, “Yer Mom”. If we ever find ourselves back in Trinidad, we’ll be sure to stop back.

Within another hour or so, we found ourselves at the KOA outside Eureka, which was the first place we had actually reserved a site at prior to arriving. The peace of mind this afforded us was only augmented when we arrived to find pristine facilities, actual working showers, and no freakish yokels.

Currently, we’re on 101 South on the way to Napa where we plan to spend the night. No major hang-ups, aside from running out of gas about 15 miles back. A sudden note of desperation in her voice, Sarah informed me that something was “wrong with the car” as the power brakes and steering cut out and we drifted to a halt on the shoulder. I might have laid into her a bit more if the petroleum gods hadn’t miraculously deposited us within view of a Chevron station rather than on some span of 65 MPH freeway; or if I hadn’t done the exact same thing just a couple years ago on the way home from an Rx Bandits concert in Philly at 3:00 a.m. On that occasion, we managed to make it a block away from our house before sputtering to a stop. Admittedly, you’re never supposed to run out of gas (especially without realizing it’s happening) but at least when we do it, we do it right!

-Josh