keely – Page 52 – State of Wilderness

Tales From the Avenue of the Giants: Hidden Springs Revealed

Hidden Springs Revealed

The first thing that happened had to do with last night. Not this current last night, but the last night before this day, this day of odd surprises. I had made reservations before our trip for last night in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park. I had struggled over which of the two main campgrounds to reserve in, until I saw one that was rumored to be more beautiful, but sort of off the beaten path and maybe a little difficult to get there. We thought that would mean less people, more privacy. I envisioned it as being in the main park, just kind of…further back and off to the side from the two big campgrounds. I hadn’t, actually, looked it up on the map. So it is a good thing that we hadn’t really tried to make it there in the dark the night before.

So here we are, trolling along in the Avenue of the Giants, taking pictures of huge trees and finding geocaches, when we stopped near a sign at a pullout. The GPS was telling me I was 150 ft away from a cache, but it looked to be straight up along a hill, into the forest. Usually in caching, if there seems to be a hard way there, there is probably an easier way there that you are missing, so you should look for it – this is what we have learned in the years we’ve been playing. Probably also in those years, we should have learned to use our GPS properly – like make sure it has settled when you stop, and also make sure it is set back to “find off road” when you have been using it in the on-road navigation function. So it seemed like the easiest way to approach this was to go up a short ways to the turnout for a campground, and then park in there and go down the hill to find it.

We pulled in and realized there was a day use fee. As we were asking the ranger about the possibility of accessing the area for free just to see if this was the closest route to the geocache, and her telling us that she was pretty sure there was no geocaching at this particular park, I finally noticed the name of the park on the side of her guard shack.

Hidden Springs Campground. THIS was the one we had the reservations for. This one, I never would have found the night before, because I thought we were headed somewhere off 101, not 254 – the Avenue. Well, once I explained to her that we paid for camping the night before and had not used it, she recognized our name and told us what campsite we were going to be in, and gave us our little day fee pass for the window, saying we should at least get our money’s worth.

Turns out the closest parking to the cache was, in fact, campsite 7, where we had been assigned. We pulled in and explored, and then I headed downhill. Way downhill. All the way to the bottom of the hill. All the way to the pull out. All the way to the sign we had been parked right in front of when we decided that in order to find this cache, we would have to look up.

To see the sign that read, “Hidden Springs Campground”.

Tales From The Avenue of the Giants: The Prelude

After traveling the long and winding Highway 1 off the California Coast, stopping only to eat deli sandwiches in a little overpriced convenience store deluxe in Olema, we realized we were not going to make it all the way to our campsite. We were going to have to find a place to stop, soon, so we could minister to the various ailments of the Harding boys. We were lucky to find a great place to stop for the night, in the unexpected form of the Redwoods River Resort.

The place was affordable, sold food on site, and, most importantly, had a room available. We were sold…and hungry. The food was substandard microwavable fare, and the room and beds maybe a little rough around the edges, but it was decent enough and surrounded by so much beauty.
In the morning, we headed back out to begin our explorations of the Redwoods. We backtracked just a few miles to head to a secret waterfall tucked back along a mysterious overgrown trail along Highway 101. At first I sent J to do recon, and he didn’t believe there was actually a trail there. I stubbornly insisted there was, and compelled our little group to wander down it. The little one fell and scraped a knee along the way, and we fought some spider webs, but in the end, it was all worth it.

Then we began our northward journey, lurching towards our Zion in a rented GMC Terrain stuffed to the hilt with suitcases and borrowed camping gear. The Zion in this case was the Gold Bluff Beach campground, located in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park. Reservations not accepted, but if you get there around eleven am, you might have a good shot at getting a camping spot. We were on the road by nine, so I felt confident initially we could make it the alleged one hour down the road in time to get there.

But first, we really must detour through the Avenue of the Giants. Find a few caches. Search for the elusive Albino Tree. And have some ironic, fantastic, and annoying experiences along the way.

The Secret Waterfall:

Atlanta Area: Emerald Green Urban Wilderness

I am pleased to report the American Wilderness is alive and well in Atlanta, Georgia.

I took my second trip of the year out to this area and spent a lot of time hiking in neighborhood parks close to the North Druid Hills area. Next time I go, and if you go, I recommend checking out the Hahn Woods area. I didn’t get a chance to actually go into it, but I drove past it and it looks like it has all the elements of a Muir-like retreat.

Where I did go:

DeepDene Park

Fernbank Museum Hiking Trail

Lullwater Park

I took most of the pictures on my trip during a behind-the-scenes zoo tour my friend arranged for us. It might be beyond the scope of this blog, so I am deciding what to do with them. More information later as I find the time…

Buescher State Park: Lost Pines

On Saturday, we drove up to Buescher State Park to hang out with our friends.

Okay, so we got a “smilie” for it, too, since it was a geocaching event. An event, for those of you who don’t geocache, is a gathering of other geocachers. Usually our events in the Houston area are hosted in restaurants, but some are at parks. Some of them revolve around a common interest or activity. We passed up a dog park event and a canoeing event this weekend to come to this. This one was a camping event, and it is the eighth camping event our group (usually Diane, gsguru, specifically), has hosted in the past couple of years.

Anyways, after much back and forth, we decided not to camp, but to hang out for the day, go for a nice hike with some of the group, and participate in the potluck dinner.

We stopped on the way to grab the cache at the location I talked about in the previous entry. Then, we stopped again for lunch at Hruska’s. If you are ever on 71, you have to stop there! Delicious treats abound. Apparently, they have been using the same polish recipe for their kolaches since 1962. They have 16 different varieties. The hamburgers are also outstanding, and so are their specialty fruits and nuts.

The wildflowers along the drive were putting on quite a show. Not many bluebonnets, but at least a dozen other varieties. Finally, we got to the park and checked in with our friends. For a while, dogs outnumbered people at our campsite (eight furry folk in attendance!) After some time, we left the older boy with Diane and set off on a four mile hike with our dogs and two other ladies: “Gigi and JoJo”, from Austin, and Arlene, of “davarle”, from the northwest side of Houston.

The hike we were doing was primarily motivated by the desire to find a series of Harry Potter themed caches in the back of the park, but in the end, it was really the therapy of the woods and letting the dogs have a fun romp that was our reward. Here are pictures from along the way:

This hike really carved this park into our hearts. The terrain was awesome and the woods calming and beautiful. We want to come back when the ravines we saw have water flowing through them. We want to come back and rent one of the nice little mini-cabins (#3 specifically) and stay the weekend. It was less than two hours from our house, and even better than Lake Texoma SP. Come see for yourself!