Seattle - San Francisco (Part II)

After deciding to bow out from the approaching squall, we landed in Crescent City Monday afternoon. The decision was not an easy one, as the forcasted winds would for once be in the right direction and presumably carry us very quickly to our final destination. That is as long as they didn't pitch us over and sink us first. . . More than the level of winds, it was the forcasted dangerous seas that scared us. So far on the trip, we had maybe seen seas of half of what was now forcasted, and 20 ft waves in confused seas did not sound too appealing to two sailors who were already fairly tired after a week of not getting much sleep.

A small island with seabirds as we're pulling into Crescent City Marina:

Crescent beach close to the Marina we stayed at:
Crescent City supposedly had a charming downtown by the waterfront up until 1964, when it was wiped out by a Tsunami. The downtown was rebuilt on higher ground, but unfortunately the architecture at the time was pretty void of any charms. The city had the feel of recent decline, and a walk along the residential street facing the Pacific Ocean revealed that about 20% of the houses were for sale. Contrary to the downtown, a lot of the houses were artfuly decorated with old surfboards, fishing bouys and a lot of woodcarvings and wood-sculptures. Definitely a blue collar town, it appeared that a lot of the traditional jobs in fishing, shipping and forestry were in decline, and the painful transition to a fickle tourist-based economy had started. The biggest new projects touted by the Del Norte County economic outlook brochure was a Walmart and a Home Depot (oh, my...).
If the ecomony of the town looked like it could need some help, the people in town at least have a lot of options for what to do with their free time. The town had some impressive beaches, and surfing appeared to be a favorite pastime. Other than that, the most popular attractions in town was an old picturesque lighthouse, the vast marine life and of course the nearby Redwood forest.

We spent our first day walking into town, to the lighthouse and onward toward some beaches on the northwest side of town. Part of our mission was to get a closer look at what the ocean looked like in the gale. We walked out to a promontory that faced the North; the wind was so strong it about blew you over. You could lean over at a good angle. We decided that we were glad not to be out there.


Now a lesson in natural history. The beaches were bordered by a 20-foot high cliff on the landward side, made of sedimentary rocks. (First photo) The rock layer exposed at the bottom of the cliff was full of embedded clamshells! (Second photo) So this layer had been also a beach long ago, covered by 20-plus feet of sediment over time, compressed into rock, then raised up by plate tectonics, and finally uncovered by erosion from waves. I wonder how old those shells are? Tens of thousands of years? Hundreds of thousands? K took a souvenir (third photo).

There were some cool plants by the beach. This slimy stuff was interesting:
The nearby grasslands were dense with an incredible variety of plants:
The next day we hiked out to the Redwood forest. This forest is also where the land-speeder scene on Endor in Return of The Jedi was filmed. (For real this time, Jeff...)

See if you can spot K in this one:

We'd been optimistic, and brought our swimming stuff, just in case we came across some water. We were hiking on a dirt forest road, when we came across a trail to Mill Creek. Ooo, a creek! So we hiked a mile or so. And, (cue angels singing: aaaaaaaaaa) through an opening in the trees, THERE IT WAS. The Perfect Swimming Hole, complete with a rope swing!!!
Karl getting in (Yes, the rope was the only graceful way to get in):

Not a good picture, but the only proof we have that M (eventually) got in via the rope as well:
Our third day in town, we were planning to rent surfing gear, but it was cold and overcast and in a bout of laziness and anti-epic-making mood we decided to stay in and read instead. Saturday we finally cast off for what was forcasted to be still pretty strong northwesterly winds (20 - 25 kts) and 12 foot seas...

Will the stalwart crew of Ho-Beaux complete their epic journey? Or will they be smashed to bits by waves and become a shark's breakfast? Tune in next time, for Part III...