November 22, 2016 Redwood National Park, California

Today could not have been more different than yesterday. It rained, was cloudy, foggy and cold again. High in the low 50’s. It was in the 40’s where we hiked.

We went to Prairie Creek Redwoods , which is part of Redwood National park. The national park kind of includes all the smaller red wood parks along the coast. We saw elk and giant trees.  We hiked the Tall Trees trail. The tallest trees in the world are in this grove.  Some over 300 feet. They limit the number of people who can go there in one day. You have to get a free permit at the visitors center and they give you a combination for the lock on the access road. John hiking through a downed redwood.

At the visitors center I found three different kinds of banana slugs for sale. John wanted to know if they had any flattened ones since I stepped on one yesterday. . .  Hiking I saw moss and lichen on a redwood truck, many kinds of mushrooms.

More mushrooms and the leaf on the redwood is designed to precipitate moisture out of the fog so it gets water year round when there is not enough rain.  These are some of the biggest trees I have ever seen . It is humbling.

John in some  big tall trees and laying on the ground trying to get a photo of a tall tree. Photos just don’t do these trees justice, they are too big to photograph. You have to see them in person to feel their awesomeness.

Part of the trail went by Redwood Creek.  All the decidious trees there had thick layers of moss on them and ferns growing out of the moss.  This area is a temperate rainforest. It gets over 60 inches of rain a year. The average rainfall in this area this month is 9.9 inches.  December and Jan are 11 inches. Really lush.

Ferns and redwoods. In the second photo John is at the red arrow to give some scale to the size of the trees.

Redwoods and an S shaped tree. John in the center of the photo again for scale.

White mushroom, tiny mushroom, weird mushrooms, raindrops  on Redwood Creek, a fairy finger and this last gross one is wet black mushrooms.  John practiced his redwood yoga all day trying to see the tops of the trees- looking up all the way through hurts your neck.

He also had to put his hat on backwards, the bill got in the way of looking up.  A moss drapery with ferns growing out of it- hung down over a foot, wet shamrocks, and tiny, tiny fern and wet sword ferns.

On the way out the fog set in and it rained heavily. The drive home was through thick fog , hard and rain gathering darkness  with very reduced visability.  John navigated us  home safely.

In case you thought I was not there, here I am with a huge redwood.