You win some, you lose some

Currently In: Prospect, OR near Crater Lake National Park (It's beautiful here!)
Next up:  Several National Parks and then Colorado in July


Our last day in the Redwoods National Park started with a win -sunshine!  It was foggy/cloudy for most of the other days we were in the area.

We wanted to visit Enderts Beach at low tide so we could see all the wildlife in the tide pools.  Our first loss - the trail was closed due to rock slides.

Instead we took a walk along black sanded Crescent Beach.  It was glorious!

Our plan was to hike the Fern Canyon Trail in Prairie Creek Redwood State Park.  This State Park is considered part of the National Park.  We found out at the Visitor Center a few days earlier that the gate to the trail is still locked because it is early in the season and they were preparing the road.  So we were told to park at the Gold Bluffs Campground and walk two miles to the trailhead.

We arrived at the entrance to the State Park and another win! The gate to Fern Canyon had just opened that day.  We could drive right to the trailhead.  Good news to middle age folks whose knees don't last forever.

We knew the trail might have a few wet areas.  Some folks who had hiked out said it wasn't too bad so we took our chances wearing sneakers and carrying our water shoes in the backpack.
We made it across the first big puddle.

 Around the corner was this.  Beautiful. (Those are ferns growing along the sides of the canyon.)

And one big long river.  So, out come the water shoes.

This was unlike any hike we had done before - and we've done our fair share of hiking if you have been following this blog at all.

The canyon,

The water,

And the challenging path were a definite win.

I tried to get a close up of the ferns along the canyon wall because it's so unusual.  By the way, Steven Spielberg liked the canyon so much, he put it in Jurassic Park II.

Hike complete!  But somebody thought his shoes were waterproof.  Too bad his socks were not!  I guess this was a loss.

On our way back to the RV park we had a win and a loss.  And they were both the same thing.  We saw another gang of elk.  One female was crossing the road. Maybe her calf was on the other side.  She was magnificent!

Unfortunately, some other tourists decided to get out of their cars and move toward her to get a better photo.  She got skittish and lunged forward to ward them off.  One person got back in her car but the others didn't move!  They were finally told by you-know-who to get back in their cars so they wouldn't get hurt.  I felt sorry for the poor elk who was stressed by all the activity.
Our adventure has given us a renewed sense of Nature and all that She shares with us.  We try to respect and enjoy.