Backpacking was a bit of a challenge. The only backpack I had was my miniature running backpack with a capacity of 5.5 Liters. But where there's a will there's a way.
I packed up my camp and started the 15 mile pedal back toward the lost coast to reach the trail head, planning to stop at one of the two campgrounds on the way to check in and pay my five dollar fee to pitch a tent in the woods. But first, I stopped at the one nearby grocery store right when it opened at 8 o'clock. The store didn't have much to offer, but I knew I wouldn't have space to pack my stove so I couldn't cook anyway. I picked up two frozen hot pockets, two frozen burritos, a bag of corn tortillas and a jar of peanut butter (about 6000 calories) and headed off. I stopped at the first campground and explained that I wanted to camp at one of the hike in sites and lock my bike at the campground somewhere. "I wouldn't do that," said the camp host. She went on to explain that there were a lot of people in the campground, and the park couldn't be responsible for the bike, and she just wouldn't trust everyone. She suggested walking my bike up a fire road all the way to the campsite. I thought about trying to explain that I really wanted to take a hiking trail, I was willing to except some risk of losing the bike to enable hiking, and that I was happy to carry the bike and gear half a mile into the woods and hide it somewhere. But instead I decided to try my luck with the next campground host, and accepted her plan as a viable alternative.
I pedaled five more miles down the road and asked the next campground host exactly the same question. She was super helpful! She arranged for me to lock my bike and gear in a shed, and didn't even bat an eye at the tiny pack I was planning to bring.
I packed my bag with tights, a rain jacket and a hat; a small first aid kit, knife, SPOT and matches; twine, a space blanket, and forty pages I tore out of the biography of Crazy Horse I was reading. I tied my sleeping bag to the bottom of the pack, and carried my water bottle. I was in for a cold night if it rained, but with the space blanket it would be OK.
I did end up walking most of the seven miles to camp on a fire road, but it was beautiful. I saw just two other people on the hike up. Otherwise, I was free to enjoy the redwoods alone. At the beginning of the trail, they were enormous 300 foot trees, but as the trail wound it's way up to 3000 feet, the trees slowly became smaller.Once the canopy was down to perhaps 150 feet, I climbed part way up one of the trees. It's not an easy task, because the lowest branches are so far off the ground in the redwoods, but this particularly tree had two smaller trees growing right next to it, so I was able to climb the smallest to reach the branches on the next, and then switch to the second tree and climb it to the branches on the tall tree. Even then, I wasn't confident enough to climb to the top, but I satisfied the childish urge I'd been feeling to climb one ever since I first arrived in the redwoods several days before.
The trail climbed up to a fire watch tower at about 3000 feet of elevation. Unfortunately, the tower was closed, but the view from the area surrounding the tour was beautiful nonetheless. I could see the ridge I had rode over two days before to reach the lost coast, and the enormous state forests covering the hills in the distance to the East. I hadn't appreciated how wild parts of California are, despite its burgeoning population.
The campsite was just below the lookout, and I got there in the afternoon several hours before sunset.I took out my book and spent the time alternating between reading the 40 pages I'd packed with me and simply staring into the woods striving to notice details that I generally overlook. Five other people stayed at the camp that night (four in one group) but I kept to myself and my book. At sunset, I fell asleep.
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