Fog and Really Big Trees

September 12, 2013 - Thursday
Today we moved down the coast about 60 miles to Brookings, the last town on the Oregon Coast. This is supposed to be their "Banana Belt." Hah! That definitely does not mean it is warm enough to grow bananas here. It is foggy, damp, and cold; about 60-ish. We did not see much of the coast coming here as the following picture shows.

Despite the depressing condition, we walked around some ending up at their beach and then the harbor. The fog and clouds actually add a mood to the scenery, don't you think?

September 13, 2013 - Friday
It rained a bit overnight and was still very foggy, so we decided to go look at some big trees. We headed down to Crescent City, CA which is the northern end of the Redwoods National Park. After stopping at the visitor center to get maps and info, we traveled over to Stout's Grove in Jedediah State Park. There is a cooperative agreement between the California State Parks and the National Park Service in running these parks.

The Redwood's Forest is an area designated to protect the last 4% of the remaining old growth redwood trees. The park stretches down the coast for about a hundred fifty miles. It was designated a national park by Johnson, although Nixon actually signed the bill. Since only 4% remain, you can see much of it was logged out. We plan to move down here in a day or so to see the central and southern parts.

You may recall we saw some big trees earlier in our trip, at The Grove of the Patriots in Mt. Rainer NP, but these redwoods are REALLY big! Check out the next couple of pictures.

As we learn more about these trees we will pass it along. What we know so far is they have an extremely thick bark, which protects the trees in fires; there is also no resin to support burning. The 6-8 inches of bark can eventually be destroyed if subjected to fire frequently enough. That can allow subsequent fires to burn near the base of the tree which will merely cause a "burn hole". Fire may enter through this damaged area but does not harm the growth of the tree. The Indians used to burn the forest regularly to open the canopy so the hemlock could grow straight for their arrow shafts. The burning also renewed the ground vegetation needed for food, baskets, and various building materials.

The problem was that the "burn hole" would weaken them. They are relatively shallow rooted anyway (6-10 feet), so when big winds came they would often fall over. That's why you see so many knocked over. The other interesting thing, there is no lichen, mushrooms, or any other fungus growing on them. The tannin in these trees causes the wood to appear red in color and will not support fungus growth. That's why they make good wood for weather exposed areas; like decks.

They grow very slowly, so re-foresting is not practical. Old growth trees are two thousand years old. So once they are logged out, they are gone for many generations even if replanted. That is why it is so important to save what is left. Many of the ones we saw todaywere not old growth, those are further south, so I guess we're going to see some real giants in the next few days.

Redwoods are conifer trees, and do not loose their leaves; similar to an evergreen. Their "leaves" are similar to pine trees or yews as you can see in the following picture.

The amazing thing is they produce a very tiny cone; we have not actually found one yet. It is slightly larger than an acorn in size. You would think they ought to be the size of basketballs!

Time to talk about the wildlife. Check out the banana slug. This guy lives on decaying stuff on the forest floor, but does not damage the redwood seedlings. Their excretions provide nutrients to the soil. This guy wanted to be a movie star, everybody was taking his picture.

And then there are the sea gulls....

Well what would a post be without a lighthouse. Hey, California has them too. This one is called Battery Point Lighthouse. The interesting thing is you can only get to it at low tide, the path to the island is covered over at high tide. This one was built in 1856. It had a 4th order Fresnel lens and was automated in 1953. It was decommissioned in 1965, then re-lit in 1982 as a private navigation aid. It got its name from three cannons mounted on the point of land taken from a sunken ship, the America in 1855. Although no fort was there, the three cannon battery created the name. The cannons are long gone.

Tomorrow will likely be our last day on the coast, so we're hoping the fog lifts such that we can see what we've missed. From what we have seen, it is really different than what we saw up north. The sand is dark and there are huge rocks poking up. The whole area from Gold Beach to Brookings is a scenic corridor.

A Surfing Pelican?

September 11, 2013 - Wednesday
Very foggy and overcast this morning so we did some laundry. It cleared a little about noon so we set off for a little historic tour. First stop was the Hughes House. Originally built in 1898, the place belonged to a cattle farmer who made it big selling butter. Wow, different times for sure! The house is over 3000 sq ft. and cost $3500 to build. Unfortunately, after the last of the Hughes died, the house was rented, neglected, and much of the original stuff disappeared. The house is furnished with "period correct" items.

This stove is very unique. It was designed and built in Europe and specially delivered. It is wood burning.

Next on our historic tour was the Cape Blanco Lighthouse. This is the oldest lighthouse in service in Oregon, continuous since 1870. It is the tallest at 256 ft above sea level and the furthest west of the Oregon coast lights. It was tended by 3 keepers on a rotating shift; 2 on each night. It originally used lard oil, later kerosene, then it was electrified in 1936. It also changed its signature from constant white to intermittent white every 20 seconds. The light on/off was controlled by a shutter, then in 1980 the head rotated and the shutter was scrapped. Today it is using that same 2.5 million candle power, 1000 watt light we have seen in other lighthouses. They confirmed that it runs on household voltage and current. It is a halogen bulb.

We had a hankering to do some beach walking. We found an agate beach at Tseriadun State Park, in Port Orford. It was high tide, with big waves coming in. The beach is not sand, its very fine stone. We found some agates and other rocks that we will polish in the rock tumbler when we get home.

Ok, so where is the surfing pelican? Several of these guys were floating around just off shore, likely waiting to snag dinner as it floats by. A couple times a big wave would roll under and break right in front of the bird shown here. I was waiting for him to "hang ten" and come surfing in.

Tomorrow we are on the move toward Brookings, in the banana belt. We have mixed emotions leaving tomorrow, but there is not much more to see or do here. Port Orford is a nice little town (pop 1200) and we really enjoyed this campground. Port Orford RV Village is family owned, husband and wife. The facilities are top notch with little niceties like coffee in the morning and a social in late afternoon.

Wet 'n Wild

September 10, 2013 - Tuesday
We took a boat ride today. Not just any boat ride, a jet boat ride, 50 miles up the Rogue River. It was from Jerry's Jet Boat Rides in Gold Beach and lasted all day. The following pictures show the boat, well actually one of two others they ran today, along with 32 other crazy people on ours.

After a sedate 2 hour ride, we entered white water rapids. This boat is a 30 foot aluminum, powered by 3 jet drives @ 365 hp each. The boat is capable of 50 mph and the skipper came close to reaching that at times. The maneuvers he made were amazing. He would spin it 360 nearly in its own length, he could almost stand it on its nose. We buzzed around in water at times less than a foot deep, dodging rocks, running rapids up, down, and sideways, Geez!!

Of course all that got you very wet. Up river it got to 90 so it felt pretty good, but we should have worn a bathing suit and had a set of dry clothes in the truck. The scenery was awesome, but as you can see, my pictures stink. This was not a photo taking boat ride, the camera spent much of the day in a plastic bag. Check out this You Tube video http://youtu.be/noPFecP4b0Y

Not sure if we can top today, but we are headed up the coast to the last Oregon Lighthouse we can visit here tomorrow.

A Change in Scenery

September 9, 2013 - Monday
Today is moving day. We traveled to Port Orford, about 70 miles down the coast. We arrived about noon and got set up. The campground is small, maybe 30 sites. Its called Port Orford RV Village and seems very nice with amenities we've been missing; like WiFi and full hook-up. Owners really take an interest in our being here. Get this, we pay on leaving. We have never experienced that.

Since we had time, we visited the Coast Guard Life Saving Station here that they have restored, well mostly restored. There is a museum telling the history of Port Orford and many things from the USCG personnel stationed here. The picture is of their self righting 36 ft life boat. Note the rail dolly. These were deployed into the water down a set of rails out of the boat house.

The scenery has changed as you can see in this next picture. The dunes are gone. Rocks pop up off shore, but the shore rock is a lighter color. It looks like a metamorphic rock of some sort, something we will need to learn more about. It is scenic don't you think?

September 8, 2013 - Sunday
The plan was to arise early for low tide and head to Sunset Beach to do tide pooling. Well, it was so foggy you could only see about 75 yards out and Sunset Beach was certainly not what we were hoping for tide pools. They were non-existent. However there were some cool things poking up. Like tree roots. Yes, those green, spider-like structures are tree roots, presumably from trees either knocked over in storms or possibly logging stumps. As the second picture shows, even rocks with barnacles are nifty.

We were in search of a beach with dunes as a backdrop, but one we did not have to climb a dune to get there. We finally found some at Umpqua Beach, but with the fog you still couldn't see them. We walked the beach for a while. The winds were strong, on shore, and cold.

It turns out there is an eco battle raging over these dunes In the early 1900s the beach was eroding significantly. Remember the notes earlier about the lighthouse falling into the river? So they imported and planted beach grass, problem solved. The beach stopped eroding and the dunes stopped marching inland. The problem is that now the grass forms a stable "pre-dune" and between it and the big dunes, a quiet area fosters tree growth. Now critters like the Sand Plover, that rely on the open sand area, have lost habitat. So now they want to plow over the grass to restore the dune. Our question is; what will happen to the trees, roads, and businesses that are at risk of being covered or undermined like before?