Mother's Day

For Mother's Day we headed north from Eureka to a little seaside town called Trinidad.  Trinidad, California is a small town of 367 people on the north California coast  We checked on Yelp for a good restaurant and decided that Seascape was the place to go.  Bob called the night before and got a reservation for 12:30 p.m. Which we discovered was a very good thing, as there was a long line waiting.  Was nice to walk in and be seated in minutes at a bay side window.

This was our view from the window.  All these people didn't make reservations and were waiting for a table.  Each window had binoculars attached, so that you could check out the wild life.

View was outstanding!  Service terrific and food delicious.  Bob had a Spanish Omelet and I had a Crab Melt.  Both were super!!!

Fishing operations related to Trinidad Harbor are vital to both local tourism and commercial fishery interests in the

region.

Trinidad Head Lighthouse was built in the Trinidad Harbor in 1871.  The lighthouse was buried in the sea by a huge wave in 1913.  The town of Trinidad Head constructed a facsimile of the tower in a park overlooking the harbor and installed the original lens in its structure.

Happy Mother's Day to all my blogging friends.  Hope your day was as special as mine.

Lady Bird Johnson's Redwood Grove

We started the day by having breakfast at the Samoa Cookhouse on Humboldt Bay.  The Samoa Cookhouse is the last surviving cookhouse in the west.  It has continually been in operation for 105 years. You were served a lumber camp style meal featuring generous portions and friendly service. Only one choice for breakfast, lunch or dinner.  We had scrambled eggs, biscuits and gravy, linked sausage, and hash brown potatoes, plus lumberjack size toast.

We then headed to the north, passed Arcata to the Redwood State and National Park and the Lady Bird Johnson Grove.  I don't think pictures can show the magnificants of these trees. We parked and walked a mile or more loop in this grove of Old Redwoods.  This park was site aside in 1968 by President Nixon in honor of Lady Bird Johnson and her love for the natural beauty of our country.

After our hike we headed to the Visitor's Center for the Redwood State and National Park, which is right on the bay.   I love the lupines!  One of my favorite children's book The Lupine Lady,  came to mind as I looked at these beautiful flowers

We had to stop for gas and I just wanted to share the price of gas her in Humboldt county.  Even thought the prices are crazy, the beauty of our country is worth it.  Don't you agree!

We headed to the city of Arcada to visit Humboldt University and to have lunch.  The town had a central plaza and we ate lunch at Luke's Place, which was very good.  I had a tomato and mozzarella salad that had balsamic dressing and a great olive paste.  The only problem was the lettuce was weeds and most of you know I don't like weed salads.  I ate the tomatoes and mozzarella balls, but the olive paste tasted so good, I had to eat a few weeds, as I thought licking the paste off probably won't look too good.  That ended a very fun and full day.

Eureka CA and Victorian Houses

This morning we headed south to Eureka, to explore it's historical downtown.  Like many of the towns in Humboldt County, the city of Eureka got its start as a Gold Rush transport center and later a logging and milling town.  The city has hundreds of beautifully restored houses and commercial buildings.  So we were off to see for ourselves and we weren't disappointed.

This is The Carson Mansion. In the Victorian style of architecture, more is better:  more decorative flourishes, more ornate carvings, turrets and gables; more craftsmen, and more embellishment.  The Carson Mansion is said to have employed more than 100 craftsmen at one time for the carving, finishing and installing of its intricate decorative flourishes.  William Carson made his money in redwood not gold.  This home was built in 1885.

Across the street from The Carson Mansion is The Pink Lady.  William Carson built for his son as a wedding gift in 1889.  It is now an architectural office.

Although not a Victorian home, right behind The Carson House is the Humboldt County Library built in 1968. It was the most beautiful library I had seen. It is over looking Humboldt Bay and I wanted to include it here.  It, of course, is built of redwood.

Down the street from the library is the The Blue Ox Millwork.  It is also a Community School, so of course I was interested.   Blue Ox is a fully functioning Victorian job shop which produces custom architectural millwork, as well as interior and exterior details for historic homes and new construction projects around the United States. Blue Ox is also a community school, a historic park, and a haven for craftsmen.  Blue Ox is the product of nearly four decades of work from master craftsman Eric Hollenbeck and his wife Viviana.  It is a place where craftsmanship techniques of the last century are preserved and quality takes precedence over mass production.  Eric gave us a tour starting with the carpentry shop.

The print shop brought back so many memories to me.  My dad was a printer and I remember the type, and typesetting equipment so well.  After my dad retired he had a printing press like this down our basement.  When they moved to Arizona, they had an awful time getting it out.  It weighted tons.

In the Community School students learn to operate these printing presses and print their own yearbooks.  They bind their own book and then get to keep them.  Eureka has a 30% drop out rate and this community school gives students an alternative to regular high school.  Students here can learn craftsmanship techniques of the last century and preserve these techniques for the future.

The property had all kinds of old things: stage coaches, boats and even a general store.  It was all very interesting and well worth the entrance fee  One more thing.  The community school even has a radio station.  Thank you Eric and Vivan for caring for students who others had given up on in this community.  If you want to know more about this project, click The Blue Ox Millwork link in the first paragraph.

The Lost Coast and Ferndale, CA

We decided to take a drive to the Lost Coast and boy what a drive it was! The road started out pretty good although windy and up and down hills, see picture below on the left.  Second picture below on the right is the type of road we ended up on as we traveled further along.  

We drove for about two hours before we saw anything that looked like coastline.  Our directions said, " because of its remoteness and relative inaccessibility--only a few back roads lead into the  area."  No kidding.                                             The Lost Coast Range is part of the King Range National Conservation Area and is unlike any other place in the continental United States.  Here, in this 35-mile long, 68,000-area stretch of coastal wilderness, the mountains rise directly out of the sea.  The King Range lies at the base of a tectonic anomaly known as the Mendocino Junction, where three of the earth's plates come together.  Because of this the mountains rise faster than just about anywhere else in the world.

Beautiful deserted coast, which is so rare in commercialize California. We continued on for another hour or two and ended up in the Victorian Village of Ferndale.  We were so impressed that with every turn another  Victorian home appeared, completely renovated and in great repair. Not interested in owning one of these beauties but I enjoyed them none the less.

The entire Main St. Has been designated a National Register Historic District due to its finely preserved commercial and residential buildings.  We had lunch at the meat market and it really was a meat market.  We also bought a tri-tip to take home to barbecue.

We headed over the Ferndale bridge built in 1911, and were glad to see 101 to take us home.  A long day but what an incredible trip.

Avenue of the Giants

Today, we took a 32-mile drive on a road that parallels Hwy 101 following an old stagecoach road.  As the old mill towns began to fade and traffic increased, the state decided to preserve an old section of the road running directly through Humboldt Redwoods State Park. It is called the Avenue of the Giants. There are numbered stops along the way 1-8.

This is looking up through our sun rood.  It is hard to give you an idea of the grandeur of these trees.

This is one of the fallen giants.  You can kind of see how wide they are.  Some of these trees are 300 to 500 years old.

You can compare their size to our car and my height which is 5'7".

The natural crown jewel of the county is Humboldt Redwoods State Park.  This was a definitive spot to see the magnificence of California's famous coastal redwoods.  In the early part of the last century there was nationwide effort to save what remained of the old growth redwoods on California's North Coast.  Humboldt Redwoods State Park was founded in 1921.  The Humboldt Redwoods is California's third largest state park, occupying 53,00 acres, including 17,000 acres of pristine old growth redwoods.

Richardson Grove R.V. Park

We stayed a week at Richardson Grove R.V. Park.  It is just outside of Garberville, CA.  in the heart of the Redwoods.  It was a surprise to us that it was an Assembly of God Family Camp, that rents R.V. sites to help supplement the cost of maintaining the campground.  Their Children's Camps and Family Camps are in July.  Don't think we would enjoy the park as much as we did, if we came when all the camper were here.

This was there main meeting building. It was open on three sides, with vinyl curtains to pull if it was raining.

This is the insides.  It looks like pews had been donated by some churches.

Talk about see God's beauty while worshiping.  With the open walls it was awesome!

This is a picture of the under construction new building.  It was closed but looking in the windows, It looked like a meeting hall with a commercial kitchen.  Camper stay in wood cabinets that are dotted in the wooden area. Some of the older ones are made out of logs.  Very neat, I should have got a picture.  We enjoyed our stay here and recommend it for anyone traveling this way. Only one complaint, which had nothing to do with the campground other than it's location, was no AT&T phone service.  Also our Verizon wireless was very unreliable.  The campground has free internet but their reception was weaker than ours.

Texas Motor Speedway

For Christmas, I got Bob a NASCAR Experience.  This consisted of driving a NASCAR at Texas Motor Speedway.  We had planned to leave Bentsen Grove on Monday 2-28, so we could make it up to Dallas on time for Bob's scheduled appointment to drive on Friday 3-4, but Monday was a very windy day, and we would be driving directly into the wind.  After three different people mentioned to Bob that it would be a hard drive, we decided to delay till Tuesday.  Tuesday morning we headed out about 10:00 a.m.  We got as far as Edinburg, about 30 minutes away from Mission and our motorhome started smoking.  We were at the exit where Frieghtliner of South Texas was.  A week before this company had changed our oil and all the other fluids and did routine maintenance on our motorhome.  Bob decided to exit and check out the smoke.  We were still there Wednesday morning and they still were working on the power.  I suggested we just leave the motorhome and take the car and drive up to Dallas, so Bob could still make his drive.  So Wednesday about noon, we took off for Dallas without our motorhome.

We had to get up and be ready to leave for Denton, Tx.  where the speedway was located about an hour north west of Dallas at 5:30 a.m.  I am not a morning person, most of you know.  Bob and I were at the track at 6:30 a.m.  His schedule time was 8:00 a.m.  I don't want you too think he was excited.  It was a windy and cool morning.  Bob suited up for his drive.  After dressing and having his picture taken, he headed to driving school.  I got to go along.

Bob getting his helmet adjusted.

Ready to go!!!

Bob working with his crew chief.

Waving goodbye.

Lined up to go.

I took lots of pictures of Bob racing but they turned out to be all of the grandstands, by the time I snapped, he was gone. He drove 5 or 6 laps at speeds that topped 153 miles per hour.

You can see how happy Bob looks after his race.  You can see I was freezing.  Texas wind is not my friend.  We spent the weekend with Craig, Heather and the grandchildren and then headed back to get our motorhome. We spent the night at La Quinta on Sunday 3-6 and got up early Monday to pick up the motorhome.  Of course it wasn't ready:(  We finally started back to Dallas about 3:00 p.m. that afternoon, but our motorhome is running smoothly now and Bob was satisfied with the price and service.