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Oregon and the Lost Coast
In July 2002, we traveled up to Oregon to go on a short backpacking trip. Mark was taking the summer off between UCSD and Scripps, and Lacey used her vacation time to join him for 10 days. We started from Mark's house in Castro Valley and drove up the 5 through California and into Oregon. We left in the morning, and planned to camp at Crater Lake that night. We stopped for photo ops at Mt. Shasta, to refill the gas tank, for the occasional snack, and in attempt to find the Yreka Bakery (spelled the same backwards and forwards). Unfortunately, we crossed into Oregon having never found the bakery.
Oregon was green and beautiful. Of note is that on one rode there was a campground literally every 1/4 mile. As soon as we passed one, the sign for another 1/4 mile away popped up. Finally, we were 1/4 mile from Crater Lake. We pulled in with enough sunlight to make a quick walk to the lake. Fires that had just started in the area kept the skies and the water a little less clear than usual, but they were still spectacular. The walk back up from the lake took a bit longer than the walk down (gravity and all), and we were ready for a quick dinner when we returned to camp.
Rather than unpack the candle lantern from our backpacks, already packed for the backpacking trip in the morning, we sat in the car where we could use its light (but not long enough to kill the battery). We went over the maps for the next day, and then headed back to the tent for bed. In the morning we took one last shower before heading into the Sky Lakes Wilderness. We also made one more pass of the camp store at Crater Lake scanning for forgotten items.
After a fairly smooth drive with Mark at the wheel and Lacey behind the road map, we pulled up to one of the Sky Lakes Wilderness trailheads. It was a bit crowded with one other car. Donning our packs, we decided to brave the crowds. We said goodbye to the faithful Escort and headed up the trail. The first sign of mosquitoes came in a few patches of snow on the shaded side of the ridge we were passing over, but we pulled down our sleeves and passed through pretty quickly. As we passed over the ridge we were supposed to be nearing the first lake, Puck Lake. The map seemed to place it practically on top of the trail, hard to miss, and yet we did. We descended into the valley without spotting any substantial mass of water. Maybe we were too busy slapping the mosquitoes on our wrists.
At the bottom of the opposite side of the ridge, we stopped to fill our water bottles at a stream. There we met the owner of the other car at the trailhead. He was on his way out. He didn't seem to know much about Puck Lake behind us, but indicated that the next lake wasn't far ahead. Sure enough, after a short flat walk we reached the first of the Sky Lakes that we would see on the trip. Mark resisted the urge to start fishing right then, and we walked past that lake and one more before reaching the third and more substantial lake. There was a track beaten around the lake so we ambled over to the opposite side and sat down to enjoy some peanut butter sandwiches and gorp. Actually, I think it was the mass quantities of gorp on this trip that have left me still turned off to the idea of trail mix.
Mark peered hopefully into the lake for a bit while we let the food digest, and then we headed on to the next couple of lakes in hope of finding a good campsite. We finally settled at Lake in a clearing on a peninsula in the middle of the lake. We used that as our base camp and spent the next couple of days searching for fish, climbing Devil’s Peak, and otherwise enjoying our surroundings. The mosquitoes were a little trying at times, and we found out that the lakes didn't quite have enough fish to control the population. Fortunately, we had stylish mosquito gear, and bug repellent with DEET that was apparently even strong enough to eat away at the waterproof material on the backpack flap that it dripped on. Makes you feel well-protected, huh? Despite all this, Lacey's hand still managed to swell up to about the size of a softball when she made a fist.
We ended up hiking out of the area a day early. The smoke clouds from the fires burning in Oregon at the time were getting thicker, and though we knew there was no threat to this area when we hiked in, we figured it was better to be safe than sorry. We spotted a bald eagle on the way out, and stopped for a swim in Puck Lake. Yes, we did find it on the second pass. Upon climbing out of the lake we noticed small leach-like organisms floating around the waters edge, and figured this was probably not a great fishing lake either as this leachy population seemed to be so abundant.
Upon reaching the faithful Escort, we considered stopping to camp in Oregon at a campsite at the base of Mt. McLoughlin, but decided to head back into California and spend a bit more time exploring the Lost Coast. We headed out to the coast and started our journey back down on the 101 and 1. We wound through the redwoods, and eventually emerged on the coast of California again. We stopped at a campsite well-past sunset, stuck our $5 in the deposit box, and pulled out our sleeping bags for a night in the car. In the morning, we brushed our teeth and were on the road again.
We took a stroll in Crescent City seeing a lighthouse and banana slugs, stopped so that Mark could take a few casts into the Klamath right before it went out to sea, explored some of the dunes on Humboldt Bay, walked a little bit of Gold Bluffs Beach, stopped to watch the Elk on the road to Gold Bluffs, drove through the Avenue of the Giants, stopped to admire the Direville Giant, and caught the road out to Shelter Cove and the Lost Coast at Garberville. Our plan was to spend our first night in the Lost Coast in a campground. So our first order of business was to find a campsite. After a busy day, the memory of how easy it was to set up "camp" the night before, and the swarm of mosquitoes that stuck to us as soon as we emerged from the car, we set up for another night in the car. We took a brief walk, cooked a quick dinner on the stove outside, and climbed into the Escort so that we could eat without being eaten ourselves.
The next morning we were off to the Shelter Cove Oceanfront Inn for our first shower five days, and two nights in the hotel to unwind before Mark went back to his summer of travel and Lacey went back to work. We still spent our days hiking and fishing, but listened to the waves at night from a room with a spa and a view of the beach. After cleaning up, we headed to Black Sand Beach. We walked north until lunch time and set up on a log to enjoy a quick meal. The beach is covered with very small black rocks (hence the name), and the coast is obviously treacherous. The beach is steep and the waves break with a crushing force on the shore, so once out in the water, it would be very hard to get back on land. Add to that strong tides, and you have a very powerful combination. Warning signs were especially strong next to reports of three students swept out to sea and never found. Parts of the area are impassible during some tides so visitors have to make sure to check the tide calendars.
After lunch we headed back the way we had come, and went back into town. Shelter Cover is a small town, that doesn't appear to have changed or grown much since it was founded. It is actually the only township in the Lost Coast region separated from the highways to the east by the widely impassible Kings Range. It was developed as a port to supply the farms inland, and later became a fishing town. The cove with its boat ramp is a great place to launch a fishing boat. The town consists of a couple hotels, a couple of general stores, a restaurant, and a campground. Homes dot the hillside. Unable to get into the restaurant at the top of the boat ramp, we headed back to the restaurant at our hotel. Dinner was very enjoyable and our view of the ocean, like the view from our room was gorgeous as the sun went down.
We enjoyed our first night back in a real bed, and headed out the next morning for the cove. We caught the biggest surf perch we had seen. It made the trip for Mark, who had been expecting more fish than we had seen up to this point. He measured the biggest ones on his pole and found them to be 13"-14". Happy with our success, we headed back to the hotel and got ready to hike another section of the Lost Coast.
This time we traveled south. We hopped on a trail taking us up and down the ridge at the edge of the ocean. It made its final decent into a valley that lead out to a black sandy beach. We passed someone's campsite, but there was no one in site. We headed out to the beach and enjoyed the beauty and solitude before heading back. On the way back, Mark told me about how the last time he was on this trail they had done a bit of off-roading, and Hari ended up getting poison oak. No off-roading for us.
We headed back for one more relaxing night at the Oceanfront Inn, one more successful morning of fishing at the cove, and the drive back to Oakland. We stopped on the way at Point Reyes, mostly for a break from the curving road. We had lunch in Fort Bragg, poked around a few cute coastal towns, and got into the Bay Area traffic after coming back inland at Santa Rosa. Welcome back to the real world!
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