Friday, June 3, 2016

Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park

Sequoia sempervirens (Coast Redwood)


Prairie Creek

Cathedral Trees Trail 

Little Creek Trail

Oxalis oregana (Redwood Sorrel)

Disporum hookeri (Hooker's Fairy Bells) Photos taken in April 2014

You can find Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park in northern California between Crescent City & Eureka.  It exists in a very green & beautiful part of the world with beaches, redwood forest & meadows grazed by Roosevelt elk. You can stay at either Elk Prairie or Gold Bluffs Beach campgrounds.  But I think most people drive through this park along Newton Drury Scenic Parkway, perhaps stopping to walk some of the 75 miles of hiking trails. We walked on the Little Creek Trail from the north end of the trail to Elk Prairie, where we saw elk at a distance.  Then we walked back to the car along the Rhododendron Trail, which was not as lovely.  We saw many huge redwood trees along both trails, as well as forest plants that grow near the Pacific coast from northern California into British Columbia.  The redwoods themselves barely extend north across the Oregon border.  Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park is managed cooperatively by the National Park Service & the California Department of Parks and Recreation, along with Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park, Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park & Redwood National Park.

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