The Redwoods

Friday, August 24 was sadly our final day in Oregon.  While we were in Medford, we went to see the Medford Temple:

Had to add another mission picture of Russell at the Medford Temple.  The Medford Temple is one of the smaller temples so they don't have a visitor center and it is only open at certain times or by appointment.  On Fridays the temple doesn't open until 3 or 4 pm so it was closed when we were there.  This temple had been dedicated a little while before Russell went on his mission so it was still pretty new when he was there. 

We had originally planned to drive halfway home this day and make it to Lake Tahoe and see the sites there but instead the Hartshorn's convinced us to go to the Redwoods since we were so close.  I am so glad we did that instead because these trees and forests were amazing!!  So we headed back toward the coast near Crescent City, CA.  This is were the Redwood National Forest is.  The park ranger said the best place to go was a place called Stout Grove.  It really was an excellent place to see so many huge Redwood trees.

These pictures do not even come close to showing you how big these trees were.  As you can see though we look like miniature people standing next to them.  The tree in the last picture was the biggest one we saw.  Colby and Emily look so tiny compared to the trunk of that tree.  This tree had a trail going around the trunk like people had just constantly walked around it looking at its grandeur!  This tree was probably bigger around than my whole dining room!

There were also some fallen redwoods so we could see just how big their root base was.  Once again we look like minis compared to these huge trees.

Below is a picture of  growth on the side of on of the trees.  We thought it looked like a monkey or something so we took a picture of it.

Here is a little comparison picture of what redwoods look like when they are smaller.  The tree in front, next to Emily, is a young Redwood.  The tree behind it is an older Redwood.  It is amazing how big they can get.

The trunks of these trees were bigger than our car!  Our car looks like a Matchbox car next to them.

After exploring the Redwood Forest for quite a while, we realized we better get moving because we had a long drive ahead of us if we were going to make it home by the next day.  As we were leaving the park, a black bear ran across the street right in front of our car!  It was so cool to see and the bear was running so fast we almost missed it.

As we left the forest, Paul Bunion and Babe the Blue Ox bid us farewell and waved goodbye to us. 

We drove and drove and drove until we reached Willow Creek, CA were we stopped for dinner.  This little town is, I guess, known for Bigfoot sitings because everything was decorated with Bigfoot paintings.  The restaurant we ate at was actually called Bigfoot Cafe!  Everyone there was really nice and they were amazed we had travelled so far and still had a long trip ahead of us.  After eating, we got the kids into pajamas and settled in for a long all night drive again.  The park ranger at the Redwoods said that Hwy 44 (the road we came up on) was closed because of the forest fires and said we would have to take I-5 clear to Sacramento and then up to Reno to get home.  We prayed this wasn't true because it would have added 2 hours onto our drive.  When we got to I-5 and Redding, CA, we stopped for gas and checked the California road conditions website on my phone.  The website said Hwy 44 was open and the only closures were north of where we would get onto the road and we were going south!  We were so glad that we were able to take that Highway home instead of detouring clear to Sacramento.  We drove all night while the kids slept until we got to somewhere outside of Reno and couldn't go anymore.  We stopped and slept in the car for a few hours until the sun woke us up at 6:30.  Then we continued our long boring drive through Nevada...  Like I said before, there is absolutely nothing in Nevada but sage brush and a few cows.  I was so glad we drove during the night on the way to Oregon because I don't think I could have handled driving through this desert twice.  This area through Nevada is where all of the military do all of their missile testing and what not.  It is also Area 51 where all of the aliens have been sited.  In fact the highway is actually called the Extraterrestrial Highway!  When we drove this road at night you could see why it was called that because it was kind of creepy and I swear we saw flashing lights in the sky as we drove!

After driving for what seemed like FOREVER, we finally made it out of Nevada and back home to sunny St. George on Saturday, August 25.  We had an amazing trip and saw so many fun things.  This trip was well worth our time, money, and effort to get it planned and worked out.  The kids had a blast and are still talking about it.  We took over 300 pictures during this week and it has been fun going back through them and deciding which ones to keep, post, and delete the duplicates.  I wish we could travel all of the time and just see everything in the world but unfortunately we have to go to work too.  Once again we had a blast!  Now to plan our next trip... hum... any suggestions?