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Mirror Lake is located in Mount Hood forest and it is about an hour East of Portland. The trail head of Mirror Lake is directly off Highway 26 and thus brought a lot of traffic to this terrific hiking trail. The trail itself is about 1.6 miles long that goes to Mirror Lake and makes a loop around the lake. There are also camp sites for backpackers around the lake on first come first server basis.
We left our home around 7:30AM and got to Mirror Lake trail head around 9AM. When we got there, the parking lot at Mirror Lake was completely filled. It was also a small parking lot, so if you want to get a parking spot there, you will have to come before 8AM. Since we cannot find a parking spot, we drove a mile further and parked the car at Ski Bowl. Ski Bowl requires you to purchase a parking permit during the winter, but parking is free during the summer. Also, there is restroom if you need to use it. After we parked our car, we walked back down on the side of Highway 26 to the trail head. The side of Highway 26 is easy enough for people to walk on, just be careful for some pot holes.
The Mirror Lake hiking trail starts with a narrow wooden bridge for people to walk across the creek. Then we entered the forest and it was pretty dark in the forest even though it was a sunny bright day. The trail elevates a little bit, but not much elevation gain here. Along the hiking trail, we also saw many chipmunks following us around. Note that do not feed the chipmunks even though they look really cute when they are begging for food!. After around 5 switchbacks, we reached the lake!
The lake surface was very calm and reflected the mountain and the trees. From the South side of the lake, we could see Mount Hood and its reflection on the lake! There were some part of the trail where we walked through the marsh but it is not too big of a deal. Many people brought chairs and picnic sets to enjoy the day there. There were also people who brought canoes with them.
Overall, Mirror Lake is a great place to spend the summer weekend at and enjoy the nature. It is definitely a great spot to just sit there for the entire afternoon and enjoy the sun shine.
Redwood National Park is an amazing place to be surrounded by giant trees! Redwood National Park is located at Northern California by the west coast. It is about 6 hours of drive from Portland and it is essentially in between Portland and San Francisco.
On the beautiful Saturday of the summer, we left our home early and headed to Redwood National Park. We drove past Salem, Eugene and Grand Pass. After getting past Grand Pass, this is when we switched off from I-5 to Highway 101. The mountain road is quite winding but easy to drive. Once we reached California border, there was border patrol to check that we did not bring live stocks.
We first reached the visitor center at Jedediah Smith Redwood State Park. We had a rest there and gathered some information on where to visit. Then we headed to Crescent City for a quick lunch.
We chose to stay at Holiday Inn at Klamath this time. This is because Klamath is in the middle of all the Redwood National and State Parks. It is a very convenient location to visit all the attractions. However, we did not have a good experience at this Holiday Inn location. When we checked in and entered the room, the room smelled so bad like sweat. We turned on the fan to the highest rotation and it could not get rid of the smell. We also had issues with the water in the bathroom. It looked like it did not have enough water pressure to supply to all rooms if there are too many rooms using water at the same time. This Holiday Inn does have 1 plus side, which is providing free breakfast. So we usually have a good breakfast before heading out and skip lunch.
On the first day, after we checked in, we had a good rest at the hotel since it was a long drive. We were planning on where to go for the next few days.
On the second day, we first drove the Elk Prairie Creek Park visitor center to acquire the permit for Tall Tree Grove access. While we were there, we saw many elks! These elks were huge! After acquiring the access, we went to Tall Tree Grove. Tall Tree Grove was amazing and it is a must visit. In the afternoon, we went to Trillium Falls for a good short hike and a beautiful view of waterfall.
On the third day, we went to Lady Bird Johnson Grove early in the morning to see the sun light shining through the mist. Then we took the hike on James Irvine Trail to get to Fern Canyon. James Irvine Trail is a long trail. So if you want to visit Fern Canyon, you can actually drive on the unpaved road to there.
On the fourth day, we took a scenic drive on Howland Hill Road. It is an unpaved road but the scenery is amazing. We then hiked the Boy Scout Tree Trail. In the afternoon, we actually drove further South to Eureka. Eureka is a beautiful Victorian city with beautiful Victorian styled mansion. Later in the afternoon, we went to visit the Big Tree and had some fun around it.
On the early fifth day, we packed up and went home. It was an amazing experience at Redwood National and State Park. We have never seen such big trees before. It is definitely a place that you must visit!
Trillium Fall is a beautiful little waterfall at the Redwood forest. There aren't many waterfalls in the Redwood forest, thus Trillium Fall has been a popular attraction for tourists to visit. Trillium Fall is located at Redwood Prairie Creek State Park and the hiking trail starts at Elk Meadows. While you are at elk meadows, you could often see elks around the area. However, do not try to approach the elk and they are still wild animals and could be dangerous when they feel threat.
We went to Trillium Fall in the afternoon and surprisingly there weren't many people. We started walking down the hiking trail and saw many people on the trail as well. The trees are just beautiful along the trail.
This trail is actually quite short with only 2.5 miles round trip distance. Trillium Fall is located about 0.5 miles from the trail head and we got there quite fast within 15 minutes. We saw people climbing down under the bridge to get a more clear shot with the waterfall. Just be very careful not to slip on the rock.
Once we hiked past the waterfall, the hiking trail starts to get boring and not as exciting. All we see were tress and trees and tress. It also looked like not many people went past beyond the point of waterfall. So we were pretty much hiking on the trail along beyond the bridge at waterfall.
After an hour, we finally completed the trail and got back to the parking lot. The exciting part is that when we got back to the parking lot, we saw a herd of elks enjoying their food on the grass field!
Overall, Trilium Fall is a must visit place at Redwood forest, but it is not that exciting once you are past the waterfall.
Tall Tree Grove is where the tallest trees live on Earth! Tall Tree Grove is located in Redwood National Park and only allows limited number of visitors to enter the area each day. Not many visitors actually visit this place because the place is harder to get to and a little out of the way from other places in Redwood forest.
We did our research on this and think that this is definitely a must visit place in Redwood National Park. Before visiting Tall Tree Grove, we went to visitor center first to acquire the permit to visit Tall Tree Grove. The ranger at the visitor center told us that they are only distributing 10 permits today and we are lucky to get one! While getting the permit, the ranger also gave us a map with direction on how to get there. She told us not to trust GPS since GPS will route us to wrong place.
We followed the direction on the map and drove on Bald Hills Road. We kept going for 30 minutes and got to the gate that leads to Tall Tree Grove. The ranger at the visitor center gave us the code to unlock the gate. To our surprise, the gate is unlocked! We were a bit confused but went past the gate anyway. We drove on the unpaved gravel road for 15 more minutes and finally got to the trail head. We were surprised that there were already so many people there! It looks like some people camped here last night.
The trail itself is about 2 miles long. So 4 miles in total. Unlike many other trail, this trail does not ascend. The trail descends instead. We started to walk on the trail and already saw many tall trees. At one place where a giant tree fell down, a door way was carved out to allow hikers to pass through. It is also a popular photo shoot spot.
The trail continued to descend and we finally reached Tall Tree Grove. It was a breath taking view! These trees are just giants. Probably taller than most of the buildings in downtown Portland!
Overall, Tall Tree Grove is a must visit place when visiting Redwood National Park. It might be a bit out of the way, but it is definitely worth it. The only downside is that there is a lot of mosquitos around the area, so make sure you bring a bug spray!
James Irvine trail is a 5 mile long trail located in Redwood Prairie Creek State Park in Northern California. This trail head starts at the visitor center and goes all the way to the coast. This trail is considered as a difficult trail due to its length but the trail itself does not have much elevation gain. The trail was quite wide as well and easy to walk on. On this trail, it also intersects with Miner's Ridge trail and many other smaller trails that you can take or loop back to visitor center.
We started on this trail early in the morning since the trail is quite long. To our surprise, we did not see many people on the trail. This is probably due to the length of the trail. There are times that we had to go across the river on a bridge. Compare to other trails in Redwood forest, James Irvine trail is less exciting to hike on. There isn't any special scenery other than trees, trees, and more trees. Although the trees are huge, tall, and beautiful, it starts to irritate us as we hike down this 5 mile long trail. Since completing a 5 miles long trail is a big accomplishment and we do want to get to Fern Canyon, we continued on.
We did not take any break in between since the trail itself is pretty flat and easy. It is just pretty long. We did see a few people taking a rest on the side to catch their breath. After 2.5 hours of hiking, we finally got to the end of the trail near the coast. It was a relieve! We stayed there for an hour or so to have some snack and re-energize ourselves.
Unfortunately James Irvine trail is not a loop trail. So we had to walk back on the same path. There were other trails that we could take to get back to visitor's center, but it would take more time. Heading back to the visitor's center was not too bad. We were able to walk a lot faster and got back within 2 hours. It was a great accomplishment!
Overall, this trail is not that exciting. For people visiting Redwood National Park, this would be one of the trail that you can skip if your schedule is tight. However, if you would like to do a long hike, this is a good trail to do so.
Fern Canyon is located near the coast of Redwood forest in Northern California. It is a beautiful 0.25 miles long canyon with lush green ferns growing on both sides of canyon walls that are 15 feet high. After having lot of hikes in the Redwood forest, it is a nice change of scenery and enjoying the water stream running within the canyon.
There are 2 ways to get to the canyon. The easiest way is to drive along an unpaved gravel road along the coast to get to the entrance of Fern Canyon. The other way is to hike the James Irvine trail from Redwood Elk Prairie Park visitor center and it leads to Fern Canyon. The second way takes longer since the trail is about 5 miles long. We chose to take the hike to Fern Canyon and started early in the morning. It took us about 2.5 hours to get to Fern Canyon and we were very exhausted. But once we saw the green lush ferns, we were energized again!
There are wooden boards paced on top of the running water stream to allow tourist to walk across the stream. So we were able to go all the way into the end of the canyon. There were few part of the canyon that were partially blocked by wooden logs and we had to climb over them.
When we were there, one woman fell down from the wooden log and broke her leg and shoulder. That was a scary moment. Luckily a range was scouting the area and was able to call for help with his satellite phone. 20 minutes later, many emergency personals showed up with first aid kit and oxygen bags.
Fern Canyon was definitely an interesting place to visit. When visiting Fern Canyon during the morning, we could still see thick mist in the canyon that creates a mysterious scene.
Fern Canyon was also the place where Jurassic Park The Lost World shot one of its scenes. It is the scene where one of the mercenary got chased down by chomps and got killed eventually.
When visiting Redwood National Park, do make sure you visit Fern Canyon and you will not regret!
Boy Scout Tree Trail is located in Jedediah Redwood State Park in Northern California. It is about just 15 minutes drive from Crescent City. The trail itself is about 5 miles long round trip with very little elevation gain. This trail is not as popular as many other trails in Redwood National/State Parks because the trail head is not as easy to reach.
We did however want to hike this trail when we visited Redwood National Park. We left early in the morning and drove on Howland Hill Road. Howland Hill Road is a beautiful scenic drive in the Redwood forest. The only downside is that it is a gravel road instead of a paved road. The road was very poorly maintained and there were pot holes everywhere! We were driving on Howland Hill Road for about 30 minutes before we got to the trail head because we had to drive very slowly to avoid the big pot holes. By the time we got to the trail head, the car was covered in dust.
When we got to the trail head, there were only 2 cars there. We got prepared and sprayed ourselves with mosquito repellant since we knew there would be tons of mosquitos on the trail. We entered the trail and we started to see giant Redwood trees. These Redwood trees are tall and beautiful. Although it was a sunny day, it was quite dark in the forest because these Redwood trees have blocked the sun light.
There were also many Redwood trees that have fallen down onto the ground. We could walk on the log and take some pictures. We saw few people climbing onto the fallen Redwood tree that was way above the ground. We were hoping that they would not fall.
The hike was easy and enjoyable. There were bridges built to help hikers to get across the creek and there were also stair cases built to help people to climb.
After about an hour, we got to the sign the says "B.S. Tree" with an arrow pointing to the right to the top of a small hill. We went up the hill and could not find where Boy Scout Tree is! We looked around and went back down to make sure the sign is correct and still could not find Boy Scout Tree. Then we went back up on to the small hill again, raised our head, and there it is! There is a wooden plaque that says "Boy Scout Tree" and it is nailed onto the giant Redwood tree! We did not see it the first time because the wooden plaque was way too high!
Overall, it was a good hike. The only downside is that the drive to the trail was painful. If you plan to hike this trail, make sure you also remember to bring mosquito repellant!
Lady Bird Johnson Grove is an amazing hiking trail located at Redwood National Park in Northern California. It is a short trail that is only about 2 miles long round trip. The trail head is located high in the mountain. In order to get there, we had to drive on Bald Hills Road for about 20 minutes all the way up in the mountain through the thick fog to get to the trail head. Once we got through the thick fog and to the trail head, we were greeted by the light rays escaping through the fog. That scenery was just beautiful!
We woke up very early in the morning around 6AM to have breakfast and get prepared so that we can get to Lady Bird Johnson Grove by 8AM. The drive on Bald Hill Road was not too bad since it is a paved road and not too narrow. However, Bald Hills Road does have some sharp turns and sometimes it is hard to see the car coming from the other direction. In addition, before getting to the trail head of Lady Bird Johnson Grove, we had to drive through this thick fog covering the mountain and it was quite dark in the fog. We did turn on the head light of the car for safety precaution.
We got to the trail head around 8:30AM and it was perfect timing. Seeing the light rays shining through the fog was an unforgettable experience. Since we got here early, we were able to take several amazing pictures while not many people are around.
The trail started on a bridge going across the road. Then the trail heads downwards into the forest and into the fog. It was such an amazing experience to hike in the forest while the fog surround you with sun light starts to glitter through the fog.
The trail itself was quite easy. Not much elevation gain and the trail was well maintained and wide. The trail also fork off and go to Berry Glen if you want a more challenging hike.
At 10AM, a ranger will start a guided tour starting at the trail head and that is when this hiking trail starts to get crowded. The parking lot starts to get full and it becomes harder to take quality photos due to the crowd. Thus we recommend to hike this trail before 9 if possible.
Overall, although Lady Bird Johnson Grove is a short trail, it provides an amazing and unforgettable experience. It is definitely a must go to hiking trail when visiting Redwood National Park!
Eureka is a Victorian styled city located at the coast of Northern California. Eureka is about an hour drive time South of Crescent City and about 7 hours away from Portland. The scenic Highway 101 actually does pass through this beautiful Victorian city. At the Old Town District of Eureka, there are many Victorian styled buildings that have been there since the 1900s. We were having vacation at Redwood National Park over the long weekend and happened to head further South and stumbled upon this beautiful Victorian city.
The most famous Victorian styled building at Eureka is Carson Mansion. It is located at the North end of the Old Town District. The Carson Mansion is the green building at the top of the hill. It has the iconic court yard at the front of the building with fence and gate around it. Since Carson Mansion is a privately held club location, it is not open to public visit. After doing some research, it looks like the club held at the Carson Mansion is a gentlemen's club where only gentlemen can attend. We actually wonder what it means to be a gentlemen's club. Although Carson Mansion is not open to public, it does have a web site that shows the interior of the building. From the images on the web, the interior of Carson Mansion still remained to be Victorian style.
Further down the street from Carson Mansion, many Victorian styled building can be seen along the street. During the July 4th Independence Day long weekend, festivals were held on the street with street food and music celebrating Independence Day. Even though many of these Victorian buildings have been there for a long time, the interior and exterior of the buildings are very well maintained. Many of the buildings have been transformed to become hotels, offices, and even restaurants.
From time to time, we also saw horse carriage running down the street and giving rides to people to take them from one place to another. To our surprises, we did not find any strong horse scent along the street, which is good.
Overall, Eureka is definitely an interesting city to visit while visiting Redwood National Park. Eureka is only an hour away and it is also nice to go into the city after spending few days in the forests with giant trees!
