2022 Road Trip to Seattle: Family and Redwood Coasts

Created 3-Oct-22

Five family members, 13 days, 2210 miles round trip: our road trip up the coast, from Portola Valley, California to Seattle, Washington, with an extension to Vancouver, British Columbia. Rogelia, Jameson, Ixchel, Helen, and Dan. Rogelia had first dibs at driving; others filled in. Helen and Dan put the others on the bus to Vancouver, and then we drove home from Seattle.

The first six days were along the coast, seeing new country. Two nights at Humboldt Redwoods State Park, Avenue of the Giants. We stayed in cabins along the diminished South Fork of the Eel River, and marvelled at the marker showing the height of the 1964 flood, high above the road and the site of the abandoned town. Ancient redwoods, thousands of years old, in an ecosystem they formed. A wild fox, grooming, unconcerned by the people watching.

Fern Canyon is a jewel in Redwood Creek State Park. We walked up the winding streambed, walled in by fern-covered cliffs. An American Dipper (Water Ouzel) dabbled in the shallows. This water bird deigns to simply bob on top of the waves, but dives in and swims underwater for its food. Making our way to the coast, we watched squadrons of pelicans gathered on the shore, taking off in a cloud, and forming disciplined rows to fly along the sand-rimmed ocean. Coming back inland, I watched a great buck Roosevelt Elk and his harem, grazing. Vines decorated his impressive antlers.

From Crescent City, CA, some of us drove inland to swim in the Smith River, passing coastline and redwoods in the day's outing. Then we visited a tourist attraction, "Trees of Mystery", with its huge Paul Bunyan effigy, aerial suspension bridges through the heights, and whimsical statues. We spent our last evening in Crescent City scrambling through the mist on a jumble of volcanic rocks bordering the harbor, near our rental.

We stopped in Florence, OR for a nice lunch near the mouth of the Siushlaw River. Water birds.

In Cape Meares, OR (Officially Tillamook), we were warmly welcomed by my brother Steve and his wife Ann. We spent two nights there, visiting over great food, walking to the beach morn and eve, and exploring the spit that once held the doomed settlement of Bayocean -- now erased but for some tourist signs. Now wild lands, with birds and snakes.

Then one day in Seattle. Dinner with Quin and Emily. Lunch with some of Jameson's companions from his time in Seattle, before he went to Mexico and met Rogelia.

Fox Island, in Puget Sound west of Seattle, across the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, is the idyllic retirement home of my cousin Philip and his artist wife Karen. Walks to the nature preserve, an expedition on Phil's sailboat "Hummingbird" with its dinghy "Dengue Fever", relaxing on their land, watching birds and the deer pass through. A Bald Eagle came for a drink of fresh water in their small creek.

Dick and Sue's extended family was the final visit for all of us. All ages, all living close at hand in Maple Valley/Renton, near Seattle.

Then Rogelia, Jameson, and Ixchel went further, to Vancouver, to join Rogelia's cousins as they gathered from Europe, US, and Canada. Helen and Dan drove home in two days, arriving safe and ready for a few days of rest.