May 2019 - Prairie Creek Redwoods
The Prairie Creek redwoods is one of the main forests in the Redwoods National and State Parks collection. In addition to a forest full of the giant trees, it also has beach right on the Pacific coast and several herds of elk that roam the area. The forest has an expansive, calm feel to it. It's full of every shade of green, with lots of ferns all over.
We saw lots of elk, but few birds. We heard many birds, but the trees were just too tall to see them!
On our drive to and from here, we also followed the Pacific coast highway and stoped at the Humboldt redwoods - pictures of that here.
The Prairie Creek redwoods is one of the main forests in the Redwoods National and State Parks collection. In addition to a forest full of the giant trees, it also has beach right on the Pacific coast and several herds of elk that roam the area. The forest has an expansive, calm feel to it. It's full of every shade of green, with lots of ferns all over.
We saw lots of elk, but few birds. We heard many birds, but the trees were just too tall to see them!
On our drive to and from here, we also followed the Pacific coast highway and stoped at the Humboldt redwoods - pictures of that here.
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| Hiking down the beach | ||
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| A great blue heron | Entering Fern Valley | |
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| Executing a river crossing | ||
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| A fairly large obstacle in the canyon | ||
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| A varied thrush (unfortunately the best look we got at one) | Incredibly tall forest right above fern valley | |
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| Walking through the giant forest | ||
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| Roosevelt elk down by the beach | ||
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| They have such interesting shaggy necks | ||
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| A song sparrow singing away | A white-crowned sparrow singing away on another tree | Another herd of elk |
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| Some deer in a nearby field, looking awful small compared to the elk! They also blend in remarkably well with the brush. | Hiking through the giant forest | |
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| The road through the park | ||
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| A tight clusters of especially tall ones | ||
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| The Big Tree. It was big. | So many choices! | The corkscrew tree |
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| An especially mossy area | ||
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| The forest is full of giant downed trees | ||
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| Beautiful red wood | ||
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| The circle of life | Quite the cross section! | A chipmunk |
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| A Wilson's warbler | A northern flicker, red-shafted. | A rufous hummingbird |
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| A barn swallow | Our campsite! | The creek behind our campsite |
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| The obligatory campsite Stellar's jay | Roasting marshmallows | |