Good day, For me at least, I'm not grinding my teeth, I'm not lying awake

And so today was the last excursion day of the trip with tomorrow being the drive home. I’ve been to the redwoods a couple times before and it always seems so unexpectedly beautiful, it’s just trees! But there’s a quietness here and the weather started out perfect, overcast with a light drizzle, mists drifting in from the ocean and the sun just starting to burn through.

I started at the national forest visitor center which is at the south end of the multiple parks and planned to work my way north from there. After getting trail maps and recommendations from the staff there I headed out with a first stop at the Lady Byrd Johnson trail. This is an easy mile and a half loop through old growth redwoods and always has that classic ethereal redwood forest look. I’m not sure if that is due to location or maybe just because I always start there.

The next stop was a new one for me, the trillium falls loop that was a short hike to the falls but then another 2 miles past that to complete the loop. Most people just do to the falls and turn back so I had the rest of the trail entirely to myself. It was incredibly quiet except for the bugs and birds so I took my time getting back to the parking lot.

From there I continued north and turned off on the Drury scenic drive and the Prairie Creek state park. There are tons of trails along the drive but the ones I was interested in were right at the beginning; the Big Tree loop, Cathedral Trees trail/Foothills trail loop. Danielle and I were at big Tree the last time through and I recognized some trees on the Cathedral Trees trail (really!) so I think we did at least part of that. I did a short detour up the rhododendron trail but didn’t have time for the whole thing so that’s on the list for next time. The Cathedral Tree trail I think had the most old growth trees and it was nice to be able to make a loop out of it with the relatively flat foothills trail.

By that time it was 3:15 and I had about a 45 minute drive back to Crescent City and my knees didn’t hurt yet. I had planned to hike until my knee said it was time to head back so I continued up the scenic drive and stopped at a couple of trail heads to check them out and finally settled on Zigzag #2 which was a short 0.6 mile hike in that connected to a few longer trails. I figured about another mile seemed good so headed in and up. I hadn’t downloaded this trail on the app ahead of time so I didn’t realize it climbed 400ft in the first quarter mile! But the views were worth it, while not being at the tops of the trees being more middle was still a different perspective than being at ground level. This was another quiet trail and being late in the day once again it seemed I had the entire forest to myself. That seemed like a good note to end the day with so I aimed the car north to head back to town. All tolled I ended up with 8 miles hiking, and yes a sore knee. I really want to check out the longer trails that branch off of Zigzag. It seems you can create some much longer loops connecting some of the other trails I hiked today. Next time…

I think today was the most pictures I had taken in one day so even though it’s basically all just trees I had a difficult time narrowing it down so here’s a selection.

I'm learning to fly Around the clouds But what goes up Must come down

The last three days have mostly been travel days, getting back down to sea level and drawing closer to home.

Thursday I set off from Springdale early in the morning, enjoying the first light hitting the canyon walls surrounding the town while getting the car packed and prepped for the drive. The destination for the day was Bishop with a drive through Vegas and a short stop in Death Valley along the way. The few trips I’ve taken to Vegas I’ve always enjoyed watching the chaos on Vegas Boulevard so it seemed a good opportunity to participate. I rolled through around 9:30am though so traffic was much more mild, still fun though.

After Vegas I headed on to Death Valley where the primary attraction was the Father Crowley overlook, otherwise known as Rainbow Canyon or Star Wars Canyon. This is the canyon that the military uses for low level flight training and I was hoping to catch some activity. There’s no set schedule for training flights though and it was quiet while I was there, otherwise the song lyric title for this post would have been from Highway to the Danger Zone. I did at least get to stop at the Borax mine which I find very fascinating. The economics on that whole operation just don’t make sense to me. Stuff must have been like gold back then.

After Death Valley I did get to experience something different, bugs, lots of bugs. Like a plague of locusts. Tons of them littered the ground and ultimately the windshield and front of my car. I hope the GoPro captured this adequately. The rest of the drive was more scenic; I had the Sierra Nevada mountain range filling the windshield instead of bugs. The day was full of ups and downs. Starting around 4k ft in Springdale, dropping all the way below sea level in Death Valley and ultimately ending the day back at 4k ft.

Friday morning was a later start with a short 260 mile drive from Bishop to Folsom with some light sightseeing planned to fill the time. I was originally going to stop at Lake Tahoe on the way but decided on Mono Lake instead. The drive up 395 is always beautiful and this time of year with so much snow in the mountains made it even better. Mono Lake is just a short drive up from Bishop and I did the full walking loop around the tufa formations. It seemed like there was more signage than last time I was there, certainly more people.

After Mono I needed to cross the mountains to get over to Folsom and google had selected Hwy89. I’m not sure if google/waze learn over time what kinds of roads you like, sort of like Spotify, but this one definitely gets a thumbs up. The initial climb is pretty steep with lots of switchbacks and amazing views into the valleys below. From there it’s a high plateau still with very deep snow along the road before eventually descending on the other side. As the drive continued I was also being reintroduced to civilization and other drivers. After being on rural highways for so long this was a bit of culture shock. California drivers are a special breed. The reason for the Folsom stop was to catch up with friends from work. With the rest of my team being located there it’s difficult to get together so this was a rare treat. It also helped jog my memory on what I’ll be returning to in a little over a week, a slow reboot.

Saturday was the first pure transit day since the beginning of the trip, with no scenic diversions. The route today was planned to mostly avoid the interstate with just a brief stint on the way to Redding. From there to the coast was via Hwy299 which was another fantastic drive. There was more traffic here and it seems to be actively patrolled by CHP so this was definitely more of a cruise and enjoying the scenery on a road that meandered along the way.

This brings me to Crescent City, just 330 miles from home, and truly back at sea level; the ocean is right across the street from the hotel. Tomorrow the plan is to spend the day hiking various trails in the redwood forests, one final outing before aiming the car north for the drive home.