Secret Vacation Pt 3 - Northern California

Tuesday night in California, I found a charming little motel called The Ravenwood Motel.  From the outside, it looks like an average little motel in the middle of nowhere.  But on the inside, all the rooms had been redone beautifully - new carpets and tile, fancy furniture and lighting, nicely painted and decorated.  The place was also immaculately clean - I doubt a white glove could have found a spec of dust or dirt.  The owner was very friendly and had a common room where there were books, games, a piano and breakfast in the morning.  The best part was that this was still one of the cheapest places we stayed on the whole trip!

In the morning, we started our Redwood forest trek with an obligatory touristy event: driving through a redwood tree.  They blew out the bottom of this giant tree but it's still alive and growing hundreds of feet above the base and you can drive your car through it.

Afterwards, we drove down the coast a bit farther and went to Redwood National Forest.  The trees really are gigantic!  I knew they would be big but I was still shocked by the sheer size of these living giants.  I can really imagine dinosaurs roaming the earth when I saw these huge trees.

After some time in Redwood National Forest, we drove down the coast some more and finally saw some wildlife - elk!

We then traveled down two the Avenue of Giants which is a 31 mile stretch of Highway 101 that goes through some giant redwoods.  Along the way, there are tons of places to pull over and get out and hike.  We saw a pamphlet that had an "auto-tour" which was 8 stops they recommended and then each stop had an information board with interesting facts about the area, and a few different hiking routes.  This was probably my favorite part of the trip, the views and the hikes were incredible.  I've heard that it can be really crowded in the summer but in May we saw basically no traffic at all.  We had the whole place to ourselves to hike wherever we wanted.

By the time we finished exploring the Avenue of Giants, the sun was setting and we were starting to get hungry for dinner.  So we headed south to find somewhere to eat and stay.  We ended up taking Highway 1 because 101 veers more inland for a while.  What we didn't know is that this route had tons of twists and turns in the road.  Check it out!  If you go to google maps and zoom in real close you'll see that there really wasn't any straight part of the road at all!

Eventually we made it to Fort Bragg, CA (we were going to stay in Mendocino but it is cheaper in Fort Bragg and we were too hungry and tired to go any farther south).  We found a mediocre cafe to eat at and then Ryan called around to find us a place to stay.  We ended up staying at a place called North Cliff where the rooms look like an early 90's honeymoon suite.  We had a pink heart shaped headboard and other pink furniture.  A jacuzzi in front of the fireplace.  It's pretty funny :)  But at least it was nice and clean and comfy :)  Before we left Fort Bragg, we went to the glass beach where there are lots of small pieces of sea glass.  It was pretty cold and windy so we didn't stay long but the scenery was pretty neat.  Plus, we saw Elvis! haha

Next we went to the Mendocino Botanical Gardens which is between Fort Bragg and Mendocino.  It was the largest botanical gardens I've ever been to and was full of beautiful blooming rhododendrons.  They had tons of other types of flowers and greenery but the rhododendrons were definitely the star of the show at this time of year!

After the botanical gardens, we headed to Mendocino for lunch at a charming little restaurant and then we continued down the Pacific Coast Highway for most of the afternoon.  This stretch of road is also full of twists and tight turns, on the edge of a cliff with no guardrails.  Some of it was quite scary.  Especially when you see all the cracks in the road where from earthquakes or other events and it looks like the road is just a breath away from sliding down the side of the cliff.  Right around sunset we finally saw the sight we'd been waiting for all afternoon...