We had seen the giant sequoia trees, but I really wanted to see their taller cousins, the California coast redwood. Therefore we planned to drive north along the coast in search of them. We also expected to have enough time to drive into the north central part of the state, where the city of Redding is near the volcanic peaks of Mount Shasta and Mount Lassen. Originally we never expected to be able to go that far.
So we started the day in San Francisco, in the early morning as we had been doing all vacation. We drove to the famous Coit Tower on Telegraph Hill, and from the top of the hill we had a great view in all directions, but the tower was not going to open for several hours, so we got back in the car, and left the city of San Francisco, knowing we would probably have one more chance to enjoy it on the very last day.
We crossed the Golden Gate Bridge, which carries the 101 Freeway. We got off that road at route 1, and followed it to the coast and then north. We were heading for the Point Reyes National Seashore. We had heard that we might find Coast Redwoods there. We drove for quite a while before we got to the Point Reyes Visitor Center. At the visitor center we found out that we had been misinformed. Point Reyes National Seashore is separated from the mainland by the San Andreas Fault. Within the boundaries, on the Pacific Plate, the soil is not correct for these giant trees. There are no redwoods within Point Reyes National Seashore. In fact, shortly after leaving highway 101, we had passed very near to Muir Woods, which has the only large groves of Coast Redwoods in the bay area, but we didn't know it at the time. The day was shaping up to be very cloudy, and this was the first time on the whole vacation that the weather was anything less than perfect. We weren't complaining.
When we asked about hikes, a park ranger recommended one that took us up to Inverness Ridge, an area that had been burned 18 months earlier (October, 1995) in a huge wildfire fed by Santa Ana Winds. At first, I had a similar reaction to when we saw the burned area near Yosemite, at the beginning of our vacation. It was agonizing to see all the charred trees. In the first picture from this hike, you can see all of the dead trees along the ridge.
No trees had survived this fire, but the hike took us through plenty of greenery. In addition to wildflowers, we also saw many small pine seedlings beginning the process of restoring these hillsides. I caught this juxtaposition in one picture showing a burned branch, pine seedlings, and wildflowers, all together by the side of the path.
After the hike, we went back to the Visitor Center, where there was a short interpretive trail that goes along the San Andreas Fault. This area was once believed to be the epicenter of the infamous 1906 earthquake that destroyed San Francisco. On this trail we saw where there still stood a wooden fence which had been built before that earthquake. The fence was split by the fault, and was now misaligned by a distance of 15 to 20 feet. While standing on the Pacific Plate side of the fault, we recognized that Point Reyes is traveling toward the Aleution trench, off the Alaskan coast, to be subducted millions of years in the future. What is now Los Angeles will follow, at a rate of 24 to 34 mm per year, 400 miles behind.
We then left Point Reyes in search of a park on the North American Plate side of the fault, where we could find the giant redwoods. We stopped at Samuel P. Taylor State Park, which had some nice redwood trees, and we took one picture there, but the ranger said we had missed the best groves in the area, which were back nearer to San Francisco, in Muir Woods.
Satisfied for a time, at having walked among these giant trees, we headed east, picking up I-80 and then headed north on I-5 toward the northern part of the state. We were interested in getting as close to Redding as we could before stopping for the night. The trip took us through the Sacramento River Valley, which is just as flat as the San Joaquin Valley further South, but is much less fertile. It wasn't very interesting, but it was important for us to get as close to Redding as we could, because Redding, situated at the northern end of the valley, is 3/4 surrounded by the volcanic peaks of the Cascade Range, at their southerly extent.
So instead we headed north to Redding, to find out what was open at this time of year. From Redding we went northeast to MacArthur Burney Falls Memorial State Park. This park features a waterfall of a type we had never seen before. Because the rock that forms the riverbed is volcanic basalt, it is very porous. The river seeps into this rock, and as a result it seemed that only half of the water was going over the falls. The other half seemed to be pouring out of the rock.
I took two picture of this, because it was such an unusual falls. One shows the falls, with a lot of water coming out of the rock. The other just shows the water pouring out of the rock. We took a nice hike around the falls while we were there.
We left MacArthur Burney, and headed west towards Mount Shasta. At the small resort town of that name, at the base of the mountain, we learned that there was a road that went up the mountain, but that it was only open partway at this time of year, because of the deep snow.
Mount Shasta is a round cone-shaped mountain, typical of a volcano. The Cascade Range is quite unlike the long ridges that make up the Sierra Nevadas. It is over 14,000 feet high, but the road only goes to about the 8,000 foot level.
We could drive no higher than 6,000 feet, when the road ended at a parking lot, which was jammed with people who were going skiing or snowmobiling. It was interesting to see such deep snow there. We could understand how difficult it would be to try to open the road any higher, at least until more of the snow melted.
We stopped for a picnic and I snapped a picture looking down on the little town of Mount Shasta. After we picnicked, the weather started to look poor again. We didn't want to get stuck on the mountain if it started to snow, so we came back down.
Near Mt. Shasta, there are a number of interesting parks which highlight the natural beauty and unusual geological structures found in that area. We visited Castle Lake, which required to drive up a narrow winding road for so long that we thought we were climbing yet another mountain.
At the top there is a beautiful park and lake. Castle Lake is a glacial cirque, which is a lake formed by glaciers in a special way that causes it to be very deep and cold, having extremely steep sides.
Then we went to visit the little lake on the other side of the town of Mt. Shasta, visible in the view above from the mountain. It is held back by a very large dam. Below the dam is a canyon, and there was a hiking trail available. We were unable to pass this up, so we walked a short way down this trail. From this trail, looking back toward the dam, I took a picture showing the dam between two large conifers. Looking forward, I took a picture of the canyon.
We walked a short way along this pretty trail until we cam to an area where some people had long ago thrown old junk cars down the slope. We turned around when the trail began to look like a junkyard.
We returned to the dam, and looked across the lake, back up toward the mountain. The clouds and rainy-looking weather had completely enshrouded the mountain. We were glad that we did not stay up there
So we left the Mt. Shasta area by returning south on I-5 towards Redding. We didn't get far before we found the town of Dunsmuir, which is a historic railroad town. At the entrance to the town there is an old locomotive on display, welcoming you to the town. There is also a motel near this town made up of old railroad cars and cabooses which have been converted into motel rooms. This is paradise for railroad buffs.
Beyond Dunsmuir, there was one park left that we wanted to explore, Castle Crags State Park. This park is supposed to contain some impressive rock formations (crags) and we wanted to see them.
We took a nice and very interesting hike through the woods there, searching for the crags.
While we didn't find them on the hike, we did find an old wooden water sluice which had been in disrepair for many decades. It ran through the woods along the trail for a long distance. The sluice had originally been built to supply a mining camp with water from a creek.
We also were treated to more pretty views of the mountains, and we learned that the way to see these crags was to take the road from the Visitor Center to the lookout spot. We did this after hiking, and finally found these interesting rock formations. Steffi snapped a picture of Steve with the Crags in background.
We were running out of time to see more in this area. We planned to return to the Bay Area for one final day of our vacation, so we had to drive south during the evening. Our early morning disappointment at being unable to visit the Volcanic Park at Mt. Lassen was long forgotten, considering all of the wonderful adventures we had had today. So we left the southern Cascade Mountains and returned south on I-5 through the Sacramento River Valley.
We were able to retrace our route back to the northern part of the Bay Area that evening. We spent the night in Pinole, on San Pablo Bay. By starting the following day so near to San Francisco, we figured that we had one last chance to see the Coast Redwood Trees at Muir Woods. We were eagerly looking forward to correcting our error of omission.
Redwood forests are amazing. These trees must have a great deal of moisture to survive, so they only grow where coastal fog from the nearby Pacific Ocean forms on a fairly regular basis. The moisture from these fogs are essential for them. While the California Coast Redwood tree is not as large around or as massive as its relative the Giant Sequoia, it is the tallest tree on earth. These trees in Muir woods do not contain the tallest specimen known. I believe that tree is in Redwood National Park in Humbolt County, too far north for us to visit on this vacation, but nevertheless, the trees in these woods were taller than any I had ever seen before.
Muir Woods is very close to San Francisco, and that means it is easily accessible to a large population. As we walked among these huge trees we couldn't help but appreciate the marvelous environment they created down at our level. Despite the bright sun shining that day, the trails were very cool and the shade was very deep. It was an experience that reminded me much of the Japanese Zen Buddhist Temples that I had the good fortune to visit more than 20 years earlier. The peace and quiet were quite overpowering. Anyone in the Bay Area who is stressed out should consider a short to visit to Muir Woods. We hiked for several hours and enjoyed every minute of it.
It is very difficult to take pictures of such trees and to show their size. I made two attempts. The first picture shooting straight up at the sky from the middle of a large grove of redwood trees. The second picture was shot looking mostly upward in an attempt to capture the full extent. Neither of these was very effective, but we reproduce them here, anyway. There is also a silly picture of Steve posing with a wooden bear at the Visitor Center, taken just to prove that we had been there.
After Muir Woods, while we were in the area, we drove to the top of Mount Tamalpais nearby, and took in a panoramic view of the Bay Area, including the City of San Francisco. We were heading there next, to finish off our final day of vacation.
We returned to the city to explore some of the things we had missed in our quick pass several days earlier. We revisited the Coit Tower while it was open this time. After a short elevator ride to the top, we were treated to another panoramic view of the City and the whole Bay Area.
We had really enjoyed our cable car ride when we were here last time, but we didn't get any pictures, so this time I dashed across a street and took a picture of a typical San Francisco Cable Car as it was climbing toward the intersection. Then we headed off to the Cable Car Museum, as we wanted to get there before it closed for the afternoon.
The museum was quite absorbing, and a striking contrast to all of the nature we had been enjoying. Inside the museum, we had a great view of the "Sheave Room" which is on the floor below. A sheave is a large pulley. We learned that all three cable car routes are powered from this one building.
The cables under the street are pulled into the basement of this building by large angled wooden sheaves, and then fed into the sheave room. In the sheave room, the tension is adjusted by a sheave that rides on a track. There are two other sheaves which counter-rotate, applying the power and squeezing the cable between them, as it makes a turn around each sheave.
The picture under the street was taken in extremely adverse lighting conditions, but it shows a large angled wooden sheave pulling cable from under the street, or directing it back out.
Before dinner, we took one last stroll around the area of Fisherman's Wharf, Ghirardelli Square, and Fort Mason. I had just a few pictures left on my fourth roll of film, so I took pictures of the most interesting things I could find. These are the ships at Fisherman's Wharf, Alcatraz Island, and of course, the Golden Gate Bridge.
We had our final dinner back at Fisherman's Wharf, and reluctantly ended our sightseeing. All that was left to do was check into a motel for the night, clean up the car, and repack our things for the trip.
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