Day 105 (Saturday 11/3/12)- Redwood Highway, CA

Having spent a month lounging and lunch dates becoming our new profession we were ready to get back to adventure and starvation.

 

What better way than to tour the Californian Redwoods- adventuring that is. (Don't worry we subsist, it only feels like starvation when compared to our bulking regiment at home. We had to leave. Because we were starting to have the sinister feeling we were going to be served for Thanksgiving dinner).

At one time almost 2 million Redwoods were spread throughout California and Oregon. As of 1991 only 93,000 remain and California has 80% of them. Credit for the remaining redwoods goes to Charles Kellogg, a preservationist and professional bird warbler, back when a bird warbler could be considered a professional. In 1917 a man donated him a fallen Redwood tree, which he turned into a truck. He took the tree on wheels around the country, demonstrating to the nation the wonder of the Redwoods. His effort led to several state parks. This, if you can believe it, was not his most impressive feat. It was said Kellogg could, if you lit a candle and turned on your radio, extinguish the candle's flame with the vibrations of his bird call. Another time in history he might have been thought a witch but thankfully people just considered him weird. Another time in history a man driving in a tree and claiming to sing notes no one can actually hear might have been considered crazy.

Driving through the Redwoods is an amazing experience that can be improved by actually stopping. We had both speedily perused the region on prior trips as a scenic alternate route, on the way to other destinations. This time we meandered by road and hiked by trail and got a much fuller appreciation of the wonderful forest. 

We didn't do the drive through a tree thing. There are tunnels made of rock that are free. I imagine the black in a tree tunnel is the same as the dark of a concrete tunnel. We saved $10 and found a tree we could stand inside.