Journeys›Photograph

Foggy Day in the Humboldt Redwoods

·Humboldt County, California·#hiking#summer#forest#redwoods#northern california
Two people walk on a dirt path in a misty redwood forest, while another person stands by a hollow tree.

Fog was the whole day. We drove the Avenue of the Giants into Humboldt Redwoods State Park and picked one of the short loops through the old growth — this is the largest remaining stand of it anywhere, and in the fog you can't see the tops of anything, just trunks going up and disappearing.

At marker 3 there was a redwood burned hollow all the way through, still alive, still going up out of sight. The girls took turns standing inside the black cavity, which fits a crouching person with room to spare. Farther along the trail ran straight between a pair of trunks growing maybe six feet apart, wide enough at the base that four of us together barely registered against them.

Everything past about a hundred feet up was just gray. The park claims a hundred miles of trail; we did the smallest possible fraction of that and it still took a while, because every few minutes somebody stopped and tipped their head back. Rhododendrons all through the understory, done blooming, leaves dripping from fog that never once burned off.

Two people are in a foggy redwood forest, one standing outside a hollow tree and another sitting inside it.A person stands with outstretched arms at the base of a giant tree in a misty forest.A person with outstretched arms stands at the base of a towering tree in a misty forest.Two people stand on a dirt path surrounded by tall trees and dense green foliage in a misty forest.Tall trees with a dense green understory reach towards a bright, misty sky in a forest.Two people stand between two enormous redwood trees in a dense, green forest.Two people stand on a dirt path between two massive, towering redwood trees in a lush forest.Two people stand on a dirt path between two massive redwood trees in a dense forest.

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