Moments in Dirt and Ink

Sue-meg State Park ( map link ) I almost got enticed by the siren song of a King Range permit that was sitting spare for Tuesday, which was the start of both good tides and good weather for the Lost Coast Trail. But! I want to do too big a trip to get ready in the half day that I had to sort things out, so I let that treasure go, likely unused by anyone. I decided to get out to Sue-meg for the first time since its older name was applied to the whole state park, not just the ceremonial village within, during some of that perfect weather and tides. There is an $8 fee to drive in, but it is free to walk in or bike in. Trails don't allow bikes or dogs. Fancy new signs to mark the park under the old Sitka spruce. I headed for Sue-meg Village first. It isn't a village in the sense that no one lives there, but it does have purpose beyond showing off the local architecture. The outside of one sturdy home. Inside a house including its big bear-proof doorway. Next, I h...

Little River State Beach, Trinidad State Beach, Sue-meg State Park, Humboldt Lagoons State Park Redwood National Park, Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park, Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park Introduction The California Coastal Trail (CCT) is approximately 1200 miles of interconnected public trail following the coast from Mexico to Oregon. Or at least that's the dream. Currently, the trail is about 60% complete. In more populous areas, it often takes the form of boardwalks and multi-use paths marked by the swirl of blue wave crest. In rural areas, it may be pushed to the beach when that is usable, or to the nearest public route when that is not. The crest for the CCT marks a coastal access trail at the Lost Coast Headlands. There are thoughts of a route beside the ocean, but the primary route is substantially inland along Mattole Road for now. The beach becomes impassible in several places south of here and above the high tide mark is private property. The hiking trail rout...

Patricks Point State Park Click for map. I headed out to Patrick's Point to "see it all". (This park has an $8/car day use fee.) I have missed a couple spots so far. The entrance station was in a moment of being unmanned, so I stopped by the visitor center. The volunteer within didn't know the answers to my camping questions. She probably does know various interesting things about many of the parks, but I wasn't able to form the right questions to get that either. So I left and popped over to see the Sumeg Village. It's not one of the spaces I've missed, but it is in the process of being renewed, so it's not the same as it was. The trail to the Sumeg Village starts just past the living being of a canoe. Not much change to the houses yet. These appear short because much of the space is actually below ground. Materials are being gathered. This likely represents quite a bit of work as traditional methods are being used. Then I remembere...

Humboldt Lagoons State Park Patrick's Point State Park Harry A. Merlo State Recreation Area Click for map. Now that I've finished off the named sections of the California Coastal Trail (except Enderts Beach), I still have one more section of trail, or at least trail like, coastal trail between Arcata and Crescent City: the bit from Patrick's Point to Dry Lagoon, mostly along the side of Big Lagoon. This has some difficulties. First, directly south of Dry Lagoon is a section of beach that doesn't look particularly passable, even at low tide. Second, Big Lagoon is four miles long. There's a reason it's called Big Lagoon. After that, there's about two more miles of beach before the trail up to Patrick's Point. Six miles of beach is too much. Since I'm day hiking it out and back, six miles and then doing it again is way too much. So I resolved to do it. Almost. I dithered and got there 20 minutes after the time I was aiming at, which was just b...

Patricks Point State Park According to Yelp, Patricks Point State Park has some of the best tide pools in the county. It is not a good day for it since the lowest tide is after sunset when the park closes, but I am out to check it out anyway. There is an entry fee for the park, or one can sneak in with the surfers. I grabbed some parking along the edge of the road and start down the surfer trail. It is easy to find by the guy with a board practically sprinting down it. It does have a couple extra trails to get a little lost down, but they are short, on the way to a proper trail. It takes me a couple tries to get on the right one, but soon I am on the Agate Beach Trail and may as well wander all the way down to the beach. Most of the park is trees on high cliffs above a roaring ocean. There is a bit of beach out here. The trail is nice until shortly above the beach where storm waves have taken it partly out. It is built with wired pieces of wood so it will not ...