Russian Gulch was formally Russian territory, this church, together with a fort situated at Fort Ross
Pleased to leave the rather grotty RV site, we took the scenic back roads until we finally hit the Pacific coast at Bodega Bay. The route was mainly through farming areas where we managed to buy freshly picked peaches, nectarines, apricots and plums all the size of tennis balls from farm stalls along the way. Being a weekend campsites were scarce and we landed up spending our first night back on the Pacific coast in a crowded RV park just beyond Fort Ross, but what a position, right on the sea.
The road north, hugged the rugged coastline with sheer cliffs dropping into the Pacific Ocean. In many places, jagged freestanding rocks are pounded by the waves. At one of the lookouts we managed to get to see our first Grey whale, they migrate through these waters at this time of the year.
The winding roads are slow driving so we decided to call it a day at Van Damme SP where once again we were lucky and got ourselves a really nice secluded campsite.
Its common for Americans to ask “where are you from” meaning which state are you from, they are really fascinated hearing we are from South Africa. They then normally strike up a conversation that ends up in an invitation for a drink and a chat. A couple who were traveling with their son and had been diving for Abalone that morning, insisted that we join them for an Abalone pasta consisting of freshly caught Red Abalone, pine nuts, sun dried tomato and basil pesto. Dit was baie lekker!!
Our first stop in the morning was the Cabrillo Light Station just outside Mendocino.
Mendocino an arty little town, many of the houses still have wooden water storage takes.
This windswept lighthouse stands on a cliff jutting out into the sea. All the original homes of the lighthouse keeper, and his two assistants have been lovingly restored to their former glory and are now available for holiday stays. As we have come to realize the best kept secret in America are the mornings up until 10 o’clock, no one seems to know they exist, so once again we have this time to ourselves.
A little way up the coast we started to see the Redwoods that have made this area so famous. These trees are family of the Giant Sequoia and are known as Coastal Redwoods, growing only in a narrow strip, 40 miles widw, 450 miles long along the Pacific coast of northern California and south western Oregon. Coastal Redwoods do not reach the proportions of Giant Sequoia’s but grow to be the tallest trees in the world – up to 370 feet.
Coastal Redwood (Sequoia sempivirens) facts:
• Height - up to 370 feet
• Age - to 2000 years.
• Weight - over a million pounds
• Bark - 12 inches thick
• Bases - to 22 feet
• Reproduce - Seeds the size of a tomato and by stump & basal spouting
• Cone size - about size of olive
The biomass (living and dead organic material) of these temperate forests is 7 times greater than a tropical rain forest. Redwoods are so tall that they can be experiencing 3 climatic zones at once, even the needles of the leaves are broad & flat in the lower areas to catch more sunlight and tight scale like spines near the top to reduce evaporation.
Coastal Redwoods require a lot of water, 65 inches per annum plus the moisture from fog, but a large tree will release 500 gallons of water into the atmosphere. Fallen trees take more than 400 years to decompose, during which time they become nurseries for many plants. Its estimated that 1700 species of plant and animals depend on the tree during their lifetime.
The Marbled Murrelet, an endangered sea bird, nest mostly in old growth trees. Like its cousin the Giant Sequoia, Redwoods have a shallow root system.
We traveled the scenic Avenue of the Giants road which winds its way for 32 miles through the Humboldt SP, which protects 53 000 acres of forests of which 17 000 are considered to be old growth Redwood forest. This vast area is protected due to the efforts of a handful of people who in the 1920’s “forced” the owners, Pacific Lumber Co to stop logging. They eventually raised enough money to start purchasing the land that now makes up the State Park, in all 170 000 acres are protected. Our overnight stop was a campsite were the sun disappeared early, the densely shaded forest was cold and so it was even earlier than normal to bed.
Driving through these magnificent trees, its hard to believe that only 4% remain and only 3% of those are a 1000 years or older. Our final night in California is spent at Patrick’s Point SP. On route we stopped at the Humboldt Bay Wildlife Refuge, a Birdlife IBA site. Unfortunately the migrants have left but we had an extremely enjoyable walk around the reed filled ponds and managed to tick off a number of new birds as well as the Black Tailed Deer. Today we selected a site based on the amount of sunshine and our sunny site was a haven for birds, so we managed to add a number of new species. In the late afternoon we walked the rim trail, which winds its way along the coastline offering splendid views of the sea crashing below before returning to camp for our second “Bar-B”.
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