Forest Bathing

When this concept was first presented to me several days ago, I had a lot of fun with it. Not quite as much fun as my dad would have had, but I ran down all the list of literal funnies that were to be had. And then a couple more.  I'm going to let your inferencing skills run wild and not bore you with what I actually said. Ha! 

"Forest bathing" is an actual real term that came out of Japan in the 1980s. Its purpose was to give a respite to the dot.com boom that was sweeping the nation and to give people time to reconnect with nature. It is sort of eco-therapy. The idea has turned trendy as of late as a way to disconnect from ALL the screens, become one with nature, and also as a way to keep forest conservation at the forefront of our minds.  We did a little forest bathing at lunch while we savored our last moments among the giants in a no cell service area. But we learned A LOT about conservation today.

Click on this one - it's a panorama, 

and you'll want to see the whole forest!

We spent the day in the Humboldt Redwoods Park, which is the southern most park that is included in the Redwood National Park "collection". It is also where the Save the Redwoods League was started in 1917 by three conservationists that were asked to take a drive and see what they might see. Since that time, the League has saved/protected over 200,000 acres of redwoods. At that point (1917), the redwoods in old growth forests were being cut down at an alarming rate. The visitor's center had a great display about the history of the area, and posed a rather thoughtful question: 

"What decisions do you think are being made today that we may not fully understand until 150 years from now?" 

Oof. What decisions indeed. This means things that I'm not actually thinking about yet. Much food for thought. 

There was also a section of the visitor's center dedicated to informing and remembering the flood of 1964. We know 1964 as the year of the Alaskan earthquake, and tsunami if you're in Crescent City, but this flood was also very damaging. There were a series of storms over the Christmas season. The river crested at 46 feet where the visitor's center stands now, and obviously did an immense amount of damage.

She's such a good sport. 

Our main adventure was driving the 32 miles of Avenue of the Giants. It's what the founding League conservationists drove, albeit on a dirt rode, all those years ago. 

Cars for scale!! 

One of the groves we passed was the Rockefeller Grove, purchased with money donated from John D Rockefeller, Jr. It is the largest remaining contiguous old-growth coastal redwood forest in the world. So that's pretty special. :) In general the trees in this end of the park are larger than the others we've seen. 

The last grove we visited was actually the first one designated in the Humboldt park. Bolling Grove was named after an aviator killed in WWI, Raynal Bolling. And it is here that Verizon provided us with our forest bath. Even on the side of the road, the forest has a pervasive silence that is so soothing. We had our picnic lunch and soaked in the last of these coastal giants. 

Also, it should be noted that a lack of cell service does not stop one from fooling around with their camera after said forest bath. :)

And then <sigh> we had to leave. When you're not here, you forget. You forget how big they are, forget the footprint they have in these forests, forget how they quiet your soul. And so. We are excited for the rest of our summer adventure, but driving away was hard!

107 esta Ocupado

Have you ever checked into a hotel room and it's already taken?????  I mean, quite a few things have happened to us in our travels, but this is a first! Good grief! Luckily we didn't bust into the room and make brand new friends. The door was ajar, and that slowed our roll. Our second room, was room 307, but was on the 2nd floor.... So obviously they have some kinks to work out! Ha!

We spent another day admiring big trees. :)  After coffee we headed back to Jedidiah State Park to find the Stout Grove. Here's a fun fact about the Redwood's National Park: the park is actually three California State Parks that are sort of co-managed with NPS. Jedidiah Smith is one of those parks, the other two being Del Norte Coast and Prairie Creek.

The drive from Crescent City on Howland Hill Road is only about 7 miles, but it's unpaved, and has many twists and turns. It's a treat to drive, and there's so much to see! We've driven this road three times this trip, and would do it again! (Click below to watch part of it in time-lapse). 

Howland Drive

Today took us to Stout Grove. It's relatively close to the grove we were in yesterday, but so different! The Simpson-Reed Grove was nestled in a jungle! So many plants, and barely a path to walk down. The Stout Grove today had more Redwoods, and also a bare forest floor in places. There were still ferns and other plants, but not nearly as dense as the other grove. 

I have a thousand of these pictures; I can't get enough of this view.

Sometimes I'm the tech nerd in the family, but not today! The first tech tip of today is about plant identification. Did you know you can use your iPhone? As I hardly ever think about plants, I did not! From your photo, once you tap information, you might have a plant ID option if your picture is good enough!

How cool is that? Mom totally knew what this was (wood sorrel), but we used it to track down another plant later in the day. (We think it might be a Tanoak...) Who knew?

The second tech tip is about Merlin. Yeah -- it's not about the wizard. I'd be totally into that! This is a bird identification app, and it's SO cool! When you hear a bird you want to ID, you whip out your app, and record the call! The app listens, records, and makes a suggestion based on what it heard. We identified an osprey yesterday and a Wilson's Warbler today. If you love birds, check it out!

We could have stayed here all day. ❤

Maybe my favorite photo today!

Life-sized ferns OR Smurf sized mom? ;)

Our last stop was the Prairie Creek Park, with a stop at Big Tree. I kid you not, that is its name. And lo and behold, it's big! It's actually not the tallest tree we saw (by about 100 a feet?), but it's most definitely the widest. It has a circumference of almost 75 feet and is estimated to be about 1500 years old. Whew!

And then we said goodbye to the burgeoning herds of mosquitos and went in search of dinner. Tomorrow we'll take one last swing through the trees before our journey continues south.

💚

From Fauna to Flora

If yesterday was all about animals, today was all about plants! Well, mostly trees and ferns, but that totally counts. 

Before leaving Bandon, we had some great coffee at Bandon Coffee Cafe. Sometimes good coffee is hard to come by when we're traveling (yes, we are admittedly picky), but this was a GREAT spot! I even ordered something I wouldn't have if I'd been more awake, and it was still delicious! So imperative to a great day for me! ;) 

Our first stop was Face Rock just outside of Bandon. Beautiful morning, blue skies, and a beautiful beach! We have to pick and choose our activities (stupid knees), so we admired the beach, but didn't go down and explore. Next time!

See her face?

After Bandon we stopped in Gold Beach and Brookings. Man was it windy! 

The intrepid explorer.

We almost blew away!

This picture still makes me laugh. I'm surprised I didn't lose her when her hood took flight!

And then on to Redwoods. Is there anything quite as amazing as tall trees? Tall, old trees? No matter how many times you see them, it is inspiring! Hundreds of feet tall, and hundreds of years old. And we get to walk amongst them! We spent time today in Jedediah Smith State Park. This was one of my favorite stops last time we came through.

Our adventure for the day came from the Simpson-Reed trail. Redwoods, of course, but also a very jungle like environment. Ferns were waist tall in places, there was moss and lichen and lots of other trees mixed amongst the giants. 

And then came the longest, and most beautiful 6.8 miles of our lives. We drove on Howland Drive to Crescent City, which is an unpaved road, winding through the Redwoods. So fun to drive. However...we had one mosquito loose in the car. And I was the driver. Everything you think might happen, short of me driving off the road, happened. 

Farside.

And that is the reason for the margaritas with dinner! Ha! More Redwoods tomorrow. :)

Wildlife Safari

"You just give nature some space, and it won't try to kill you!" Does anybody know that quote? Anybody?  It's from the play, "Tuna Christmas" and it cracks me up every time I say it! 🤣 Today was a nature forward day for sure.

Mom and I headed out this morning for a two week roadtrip south. But...our first stop was north with a pair of binoculars to scope out the cougar on Haystack Rock. We were there during his elusive 9-9:30 period this morning. There is no mountain lion in this picture, but I put it for reference for anyone who doesn't <gasp> know what Haystack Rock looks like. Sometime before dawn he wandered down to the beach (?) and climbed up on Haystack. And then, as tides do, it came in! As of nightfall he's still out there!

Understanding that the cougar was on beach time, we headed out of town to Winston to the Wildlife Safari. One of my good friends just stopped there on a trip, and her pictures made me want to go too. We LOVE a drive thru safari. In 1980 something we went to Lions of Longleat in England. I remember two things about that trip. One, the debris field in the monkey area. Those little guys tore at just about everything they could get their hands on. Windshield wipers, antennas, mirrors... There were lots of warnings about damage to cars! And the second, more interesting thing I remember, is the lioness near the exit of the lion area. She had a bee in her bonnet about something, and drug a small red sports car out of line, and over to the side of the road. She grabbed the bumper in her teeth, and just walked away with it. I don't remember being scared, but remember being incredibly wowed by the strength. Imagine being in that car! This adventure was slightly less dramatic, but no less amazing. Being up close and personal with large animals is so humbling!

If you've been to Wildlife Safari, you know that it's a follow-the-leader type car train. You drive through Africa, Americas, and Asia, viewing lots of different types of animals as you go.  I mean, there ARE signs and arrows, but there are also some unmarked service roads. We may or may not have had a choose-your-own-adventure afternoon and gone down some of the umarked roads. In that spirit we were much closer to some animals than we might have otherwise been. Oops.   I won't say who was driving. 

We saw lots of awesome animals, more than we captured in photo. There were so many babies out: cute!

We spent A LOT of time with these Watusi cattle. They took their own sweet time crossing the road!

One person TOTALLY overreacted to how close this animal was to us. 😜

My favorite. I always want to see a herd of buffalo. I don't know what it is, possibly the sheer size of them, but I LOVE them! And there were the cutest little calves. 

It was HOT! After this adventure, we headed back to the coast and are overnighting in Bandon. We got glimpse of the beach before dusk, but will explore a little more tomorrow. 

Tomorrow we head to the Redwoods! Yes, we've been there. And, yes, we can't wait to go back! 🌲

The Everglades

This post had many titles in its working draft. For starters: An Albatross and a Beetle Walked into a Taqueria. You know how we end up with barn swallows in Home Depot or Lowes, and they're in and out of the rafters? Well, in the Fort Lauderdale airport, a GINORMOUS bird flew first through security as my bag was enduring it's own personal inspection, and then flew straight at mom's head while we were walking to our gate. I mean, it was huge! And then, there was a whole beetle incident on the plane that was every bit as insane as you might imagine. Snakes on a plane have nothing on this! Ha!

Another working title: OJ Simpson and Crocodile Dundee. We had dinner (at a taqueria 🤣) next to a couple (well actually, 2 tables down) that was having an insane conversation about OJ Simpson. That probably didn't need to be said, the insane part. Barring a white bronco spotting, how does that even come up in casual conversation? And I'll get to the Crocodile Dundee part. 

My last working title: The Terminal.  Our ship docked at 7am, and our plane didn't leave until 6:10pm. Do you remember that movie with Tom Hanks about living in an airport? That was us on Saturday. We had coffee, we repacked our suitcases. We sat on the floor; we stood in line. We went upstairs, downstairs, and back up again. I changed clothes in a public bathroom. There were highs and lows - mostly lows! 

But, I went with Everglades because it was our last excursion, and is someplace I've always wanted to see.  If you're not picturing Horatio Caine ala CSI Miami, you're missing what I'm throwing down! Plus, I've taught about the Everglades in one way or another for years. There are numerous ecosystems represented in the Everglades (9?), and unfortunately, also many invasive species. Did you know the Everglades is actually a very slow moving river? I used to read a book to my class by Carl Hiassen: Scat. A teacher goes missing, and (spoiler) it turns out she was nursing a panther back to health deep in the Everglades. Being there, I can actually understand how something or someone could hide and never be found. It's a river, it's dense, it's open...it all looks the same and it is so unique. It's such a fascinating place!

Anyway, it was AWESOME! Airboats are SO LOUD, and so weird. They are flat bottom, and literally run on giant fans that propel the boat forward. When you're in it, it doesn't feel like a normal boat either; you do feel like you are riding on top of the water. 

Even in our loud boats, we saw numerous fish and birds, which speaks to the overall wealth of organisms big and small lurking just out of sight. We saw plenty of black vultures (plenty!), fish jumping, and lurking just below the surface, and an alligator!

The bird from the airport...lol

Got that eye looking at you! (What show is that from?)

After the airboat ride we went to an alligator "show". The quotes are because I don't really know how to qualify what we saw, and I'm sure these types of shows are a dime a dozen in Florida. Crocodile Dundee was confusing because his "humor" was mildly offensive, and yet he's in the alligator rescue business. I'm still processing him as a human. And alligators as animals. What weird creatures!

And then we hurried up and waited around in the airport for....six hours? It was brutal! Wait around for six hours and then get on a plane for six. Egads!

I love clouds.

The end of our very long day was spent in a Marriott shuttle in Seattle with a Delta flight crew that had also flown in from Florida. They were way past rummy, and as such, quite hilarious. They were watching flight attendant TikToks, and literally rolling with laughter. As we were the only other ones on the shuttle, we crowded around the phone too and shared in the humor. Nice to end a hard day in fits of giggles!

And that's it! That's the trip! I mean, I think there is one more blog, as we love to think about our favorites, so stay tuned for that! :)