Page 134 - 2020 Travel Guide to California

NORTH COAST
Picturesque fishing harbors, Victorian villages and the world’s tallest trees
TOP CITIES
Mendocino, Eureka, Crescent City, Fort Bragg,
Garberville, Arcata, Ukiah, Cloverdale, Ferndale
B Y J O H N F L I N N
GATEWAY
The Arcata-Eureka Airport (EKA), 16 miles (26 km) from
downtown Eureka, has service from San Francisco and
other hubs, but no international flights
TOURISM WEBSITES
delnorte.org
exploredelnorte.com
This should put things in perspective: The North Coast’s
tallest building is only 77 feet tall, but its tallest tree stands
379 feet tall. Until you’ve seen one up close, it’s hard to
grasp just how neck-craningly high a coastal redwood tree can grow.
These 3,000-year-old arboreal titans—nature’s loftiest sky-
scrapers—grow in only one place in the world: a narrow strip of
fog-shrouded mountains along California’s wild and relatively
unvisited North Coast.
northcoastca.com
visitredwoods.com
visitmendocino.com
redwoodcoastparks.com
POPULATION
782,000
NORTH
COAST
The Redwood Highway
Old-growth redwoods are preserved in a chain of parks strung along
Highway 101, known in these parts as the Redwood Highway. In
southern Humboldt County, Humboldt Redwoods State Park strad-
dles the scenic drive known as the Avenue of the Giants. In
northern Humboldt and Del Norte counties, a cluster of parks—
Redwood National Park (which turned 50 in 2018) and Prairie Creek
Redwoods, Del Norte Coast Redwoods and Jedediah Smith Red-
woods state parks—form one contiguous redwood reserve.
132 2020 TRAVEL GUIDE TO CALIFORNIA
WELCOMIA/SHUTTERSTOCK. OPPOSITE: TOM REICHNER/SHUTTERSTOCK