Day One

The plan was to hit the road by 7 AM, but it's 10 when we actually hit it. We were caught in heavy traffic near San Rafael and it continued for the next 50 miles. In the next three hours, we only progressed 100 miles. Everybody seemed to have disappeared after Cloverdale, and the freeway was almost empty there onwards. We stopped at Ukiah for lunch and gasoline, and resumed at 2 PM. Eureka was still 160 miles away.

An Unplanned Visit

There's a whole world out there

After driving for about an hour - roughly 70 miles from Ukiah, we read a road sign about a nearby drive thru tree. It was not in our schedule but we decided to visit it. So I pulled into the next exit (to Leggett). The drive thru tree is less than a mile from there. It's called the Chandelier Drive Thru tree.

There is a $6 entrance fee for the tree. The toll gate area was quite lonely, and looked as if we're the only visitors. Perhaps he spotted the look on my face, the old man at the toll-post said, "There's a whole world out there. Enjoy your visit". But I was till skeptical.

Paying the fee, we drove forward on a narrow road for less than half a mile before the drive thru tree appeared. The toll-man was right. I was surprised to see so many tourists around the tree. Where did they all come from? There were four or five cars waiting in line to drive thru the tree, while many others were parked near by. There's also a gift shop behind the tree.

We waited in line. It moved slowly - as tourists were taking pictures at the tree exit, yet it took less than 10 minutes to get our turn . Better wait time than Costco gas-lines these days!

Driving thru the tree, I parked the car in the shade of nearby redwoods, jumped out and walked towards the tree. It is a giant 315 tall redwood tree with a 9 by 6 feet opening in its trunk. It has a trunk diameter of 21 feet. It's supposedly 2100 years old according to a sign-board posted there.

Wondering why it's named the Chandelier, I looked up at its crown, and found the answer. Why, its crown looked like a chandelier, albeit inverted.

We then took a few pictures of ourselves and walked into the gift shop. Found nothing of much interest there, though I liked a few piggie toys. We then came out and walked up to the pond beyond the gift shop. Its beautiful there, but we had miles to go. So we took off after spending just a few minutes there.

Avenue of the Giants

Approximately 23 miles from Leggett begins the scenic biway Avenue of the Giants, at Garberville. Through the Redwoods, it parallels US-101 until it merges with the freeway 30 miles before Eureka. No trip through the redwoods is complete without driving on this scenic route. There are numerous entry points into US-101 from this biway, in case one decides to get onto the freeway.

After driving for 5 minutes or so on Avenue of the Giants, we stopped at the Chimney Tree. This is a coastal redwood whose inside was consumed by an accidental fire started by a careless hunter at its base, in the early 1900s, forming a chimney-like hollow. Stunningly it's still alive! We can enter this cave through a small door. Looking up, we could see the sky through the chimney opening, 180 feet or so high.

Near the tree, there is a Hobbit trail, with a nominal fee to access it. "An interesting name", I thought - I'm a big fan of The Lord of the Rings trilogy. But we didn't have time for a hike, so we continued our journey through the Giants.

Driving through the giant redwoods is a unique experience. There was not much traffic. In some sections of the drive, the redwoods almost completely blocked sunlight so it looked like night. I pulled the car off the road and we got down for a few pictures and a some quiet time with the big old trees. "We are among the giants", I felt looking at the serene trees. Are they watching us? They're standing there for ages, witnessing creatures like us come and go. What would they say if they could speak?

Coast Redwoods are considered the tallest trees in the world, easily living for upto 2000 years. We went around some of the them - touching their barks, trying to figure out how tall they are and wondering at their enormously huge trunks.

The road travelled parallel to the Eel River - it's mostly dry at this time of the year. We came across one or two tiny villages with just a handful of houses. We briefly stopped at a few other trees of interest, like The Eternal Tree and The Immortal Tree, which were on the way.

Our next stop was the Shrine Drive Thru Tree at Myers Flat. Entrance fee here is $1.50 per person. The scene was different than that at the Chandelier Tree. We were the only visitors for most of the time, though a couple of cars drove in just when we were about to leave. The tree itself looked like a legend whose days of glory are a thing of the past. It was leaning to one side, making it a slanting shrine.

What interested us more than the Shrine tree was the nearby houses carved into two redwoods. One of them is a two storied duplex, with stairs big enough for a 10 year old to easily climb up.

By 6:00 PM, we were back on the road. Avenue of the Giants eventually ended into US-101 at Pepperwood. Eureka is another 32 miles from there. Just after we passed Scotia, dark clouds started blanketing the sky. In a few minutes we were driving under no sun light, through heavy coastal fog, wondering if this is how the weather's going to be for the next two days. It was 7:00 PM when we checked into our hotel in Eureka.