Page 148 - 2015 Travel Guide to California

ROOSEVELT ELK at Gold Bluffs, Redwood
National and State Parks, below; exploring
Van Damme State Park, right.
CRESCENT
CITY
DRIVE
»
TOUR
From the GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE,
head over to the SONOMA COAST
at Bodega Bay (yes, that Bodega
Bay: Alfred Hitchcock filmed The
Birds there), and follow dramatic,
winding Highway 1 north past the
old Russian fort, FORT ROSS, and
Sea Ranch, GUALALA, MENDOCINO
and FORT BRAGG before heading
inland to connect with Highway
101—“The Redwood Highway”—at
LEGGETT, site of the DRIVE-THRU
TREE PARK. Continuing north on
the Redwood Highway, you’ll come
to HUMBOLDT REDWOODS STATE
PARK and the AVENUE OF THE
GIANTS, EUREKA and the cluster of
redwood parks extending almost to
the Oregon border.
EUREKA
HUMBOLDT
REDWOODS
STATE PARK
AVENUE OF THE GIANTS
LEGGETT
MENDOCINO
GUALALA
FORT ROSS
BODEGA BAY
SAN FRANCISCO
146 2015 T R AV E L G U I D E TO C A L I F O R N I A
Although it’s sometimes called the Red-
wood Empire, the North Coast is more than
just tall trees: It’s also salmon-fishing boats
bobbing in tiny harbors; Roosevelt elk
bugling across misty meadows; steam
trains chuffing through a damp and drip-
ping forest; hole-in-the-wall restaurants
serving fish smoked according to tradi-
tional Native American recipes; vineyards
close enough to the coast to catch the salt
spray; an old Russian trading fort; hand-
some Victorian villages; possible glimpses
of the elusive creature known as Bigfoot;
wealthy, tie-dyed growers of the region’s
largest cash crop, which doctors in Cali-
fornia can legally prescribe; and bouts of
inspired lunacy such as elaborate sculp-
tures racing across the landscape.
For generations, the North Coast was
said to be on the far side of the “redwood
curtain,” the psychological barrier formed
by narrow, tortuous Highway 101, which
was little more than a two-lane conduit for
heavily-laden logging trucks. But Cali-
fornia has spent the last two decades
improving the road—straightening curves,
widening it in many places to four lanes—
and now the road is an easy drive.
City & Town
Transplanted New Englanders founded the
town of Mendocino on a rocky bluff above
the crashing Pacific Ocean, and it still sports
a whitewashed Cape Cod look. Once a mill
town, it went into decay in the 1930s as the
local timber trade waned but was rediscov-
ered in the 1960s by bohemians and artists.
On the shore of Humboldt Bay, Eureka, the
largest town on the North Coast, has also
reversed decades of decline and turned its
waterfront Old Town into an inviting Victo-
rian district of galleries, boutiques and cafés.
Crescent City was virtually wiped off the
map by a tsunami in 1964. Rebuilt now, it
sports a smattering of hotels and motels that
make it a good base for exploring nearby
Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park.
TOM REICHNER/SHUTTERSTOCK; MENDOCINO CVB. OPPOSITE: MENDOCINO CVB; N. F. PHOTOGRAPHY/SHUTTERSTOCK; JAIRO RENE LEIVA/SHUTTERSTOCK