We ran out of days in our park in Jed Smith Redwoods and were obliged to move today. We hooked up the Barbarian Invader and drove onto CA-199 westbound. After a short, curvy but incredibly scenic drive, we dropped into Crescent City, where we turned south on US-101. Very shortly after leaving Crescent City, 101 starts climbing and gets very twisty but there were numerous stops for road construction which kept speeds low and tailgaters off my bum. It is a gorgeous drive through a dense Redwood forest, past an oddball attraction called “Trees of Mystery” and on into the town/casino called Klamath. The Yuroks are helping to settle old treaty disputes with white men by emptying their pockets in their attractive wood-framed sucker processor.
The town of Klamath is located on the north shore of the Klamath River. We shot right by town and crossed the Klamath on a bridge with big concrete bears standing on the handrails before exiting 101 at South Klamath River Road where we turned off a couple miles to Kamp Klamath RV Park. We have stayed here before – maybe in 2016 but my memory now is about as accurate as Trump denying being a bigot. The park offers full hookups, very rudimentary wifi and absolute nighttime silence. It is also cheap when we use our Passport America discount – 50%.
Our arduous drive of 31 miles was over quickly so we pulled into camp, set up and had plenty of time to do a little exploring. Not far from our park is the Newton B. Drury Parkway which was closed the last time we were here because a big Redwood had blown over and squashed the road. Today, it was open and we took it as an alternative to 101. The parkway and 101 come together again in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park south of us. 101 through the Redwoods is pretty nifty but the Drury is better. It slithers through a truly impressive Redwood forest with named groves and walking trails lining the road. We will be investigating the Parkway further tomorrow.
We also took a little side trip to the overlook at the north side of the mouth of the Klamath River. It is a great viewpoint and the river, an enormous sandbar, the ocean and the jagged seastacks are all visible from one place. There is a colony of sea lions that were murdering the fish flowing through the narrow mouth of the river. More of the seals were lounging on the sandbar and they looked quite tubby.
Peggy took a few pictures from the navigator’s seat and you can see them if you click here