I finally had time and finished the next post, enjoy =)
Eureka
The day after our winetasting was once again a travel day. First, we drove through the remaining part of the Napa Valley until we reached the highway 101 once again. Most of the traffic driving from San Francisco to Oregon and Washington takes the highway 5 which is farther away from the coast. Therefore, the 101 is not as crowded but also not as wide, mostly only one to two lanes.
A day before our scheduled visit of the biggest trees of the world we already came across some of them in a smaller brother of the famous Redwood National Park, about a one- to two-hour drive south of his big brother – a nice little introduction. Because of the size of the Redwood National Park we decided to stay one night to the south of it, drive through it the next day and sleep the next night to the north of it. The most northern town with affordable motels before the park is Eureka, and that’s where we stayed. It’s a small town but large enough to have a cinema to keep locals and visitors like us entertained =).
Redwood National Park
Scenic Roads
TripAdvisor told me to look out for an unpaved road just after we entered the national park on the 101. We found the road without any problems and had a very good time driving on it. Pot holes cover the road, and not the kind of potholes you can ignore. It was in equal parts challenging and exciting to maneuver around those holes.
Waiting for us at the end of the road was the Fern Canyon. A scene from Jurassic Park 2 was shot in this canyon. Both sides are covered in ferns. Unfortunately, we couldn’t explore the canyon to its full length, the water flow was too strong. We even had problems crossing the creek that came out of the canyon. We tried everything (except taking off our shoes and walking bare feet) to cross the creek: jumping, building little bridges, use big stones to stand on – nothing worked, we had to give up and return. Nevertheless, we had a lot of fun and took some great pictures.
While the highway 101 already offers beautiful sights, there are a vast number of better alternatives to drive. One of those alternatives lead us to an area with a high concentration of coast redwoods (the name of these huge trees). Once more we left our car and wandered around. We explored the woods until we almost reached the point where those giant trees get boring. You don’t have small/normal trees to compare even the mightiest ones lose their fascination when you see nothing but giants for miles and miles. But those trees are terrifyingly huge when you see them the first time =)
Extended stay at Crescent City
Our plan was to stay one night in Crescent City and then move on to the next national park. We didn’t plan much more than that. Unfortunately, once we began to plan our stay at the Crater Lake National Park we learned that cars only allowed to enter the park if they have chains ready to install. As you might have guessed our rental car from Las Vegas has no chains. Therefore, we decided to stay an additional night and enjoy the Redwood National Park a little bit longer.
One thing that was planned to do when we left Crescent City was another unpaved road. The pot holes were a little bit less frequent but not less frightening and the trees felt to be a little bit smaller. On our way through the “jungle” we found a spot near a creek that might be more crowded in the summer. There was a rope hanging from a tree ready to be used to jump in the water.
In the internet, this road is advertised as a one way road. But we had to find out that it is a two-way road the hard way. Once we left the forest we wanted to take the highway back to Crescent City. Unfortunately, the road was closed, the only bridge over the river is being renovated. I don’t know what those poor souls living on this side of the river are doing but a worker told us that it is best to take the same way back we came from =)
Ocean World
One of the best rated things to visit in Crescent City is Ocean World, a small aquarium. The small entrance fee includes a guided tour through the aquarium. Anemones stung us and we petted sharks and sea stars. But the best part was a hilarious seal and sea lion show. You can see a part of it in the video below =)
Crater Lake National Park
Our first stop in the morning was the Walmart in town. As mentioned we prolonged our stay in Crescent City because we didn’t have chains. But we really wanted to see some snow and the Crater Lake, therefore we decided to stop at the nearest Walmart and buy some cheap ones. Walmart was our number one choice because we can return the chains if we don’t use them and get our money back. And not just in the store we bought them but in any Walmart in the USA.
Luckily, someone had done the same thing before us. This Walmart normally doesn’t have any snow chains. But someone decided to give back their chains on the way to the south and chose this Walmart to do it =)
Equipped with proper equipment we started our journey to the deepest lake in the USA, the Crater Lake. Starting at sea level in Crescent City our climb to Rim Village at 2164 m above sea level began. Our ascent followed pretty much the 80/20 rule, during the first 80 percent of the way we climbed about 20% of the final height. The landscape was not bad, but the trees were tiny again and it looked a little bit like driving through Germany with all the firs.
The Rim
Our enjoyment with the landscape changed drastically once we were past the first 80%. After this point you saw the first snow on the side of the road. With each meter in height there was more snow until it was finally enough to cover the street completely. We were surprised how well our car behaved on the road (Most of the time you couldn’t see any other car, the road was completely empty, so there was enough space to have a little fun with the car on and sometimes nearly in the snow). Unbeknownst to us now our Volvo had all-wheel-drive. We could only be bothered to check our drive once all the two-wheel drives had to mount the chains =).
Without any problems, we reached after some wonderful and amazing curves the top of the crater. With my feet properly winter-equipped with sneakers we made a little snow-tour and enjoyed the view of the cleanest lake in America. Unfortunately, they don’t have the budget to clear the rim drive around the lake from snow in the winter, therefore we weren’t able to drive any further once on top.
After a warming hot chocolate, we continued our path. To reach our motel we had to drive beneath the snow-level, once again back above snow-level until we came finally back to snow-free roads. We didn’t expect to drive on snow again and were therefore genuinely surprised. Especially because we didn’t see it and were only sure after a long-lasting break check =).
