Shopping was the woeful task for today. We went into town, we bought groceries, went to the Romiano Cheese factory to get some and filled up the fuel tank. We are supplied to leave. Fortunately, due to my spouse’s acumen at retail shopping, we finished all this drudgery in time to go exploring.
Today we selected another gravel road to take a spin in the Redwoods. We drove west a few miles to the Simpson Reed Grove off Walker Road. Leaving CA-199, the road immediately enters a shadowy world where very little daylight gets to the ground because this part of Jed Smith appears to be a mixed forest with Redwoods, Douglas Fir and Western Hemlock all growing in the same place. Over in the Stout Grove on Howland Hill Road, the timber is almost 100% Redwood. There must be more wind at Simpson Reed because there are many windfall Redwoods that must have done an amazing amount of destruction on their way down but their long-term legacy was giving the whole area a nifty pattern of criss-crossing downed Redwoods that the Simpson Reed Loop Trail wanders through. There are no adequate superlatives to address the beauty of this grove. I’m glad someone had the foresight to set this gorgeous area aside for future generations. It is an almost mystical place. My consumer rating of Jedediah Smith Redwoods National and State Park is the most stars or points or quatloos possible.
Peggy and I strolled the loop trail and it is a wonderful walk. The Douglas Fir and Hemlock trees are very large but they are dwarfed by the Redwoods. Some of the Redwood trees in the Simpson Reed Grove top out at over 350′, only about 150′ above the runt Fir and Hemlock. The ground is basically clear of any little trees or saplings and, with the exception of some crossed Redwood windfalls about 25′ high, there are ferns covering the soil. There’s some tan oak and vine maple brush but those species are held in check by the vast canopies of sun-blocking branches above them. Walking alongside a big Redwood windfall is like walking alongside the hull of a really big yacht. The lumber from only one of these trees would make the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria, a half-dozen sister ships and still have enough left to bang out a score of three-bedroom houses. This is a great old, fat guy trail. Less than a mile, flat-ish ground, good pathway, spectacular Nature scenery, dog-friendly.
On the way home from the park, we came across a cautionary traffic sign that had a big exclamation point over a diagonal sign with a silhouette of a walking man with a hula hoop and a sign below indicating he may be near. To see a picture of this and some nifty nature shots, click here