California 2025-Redwoods

July 4th

The next leg of our trip was the redwoods area. We stayed in Klamath, CA at a little campground called Mystic Forest RV Park. It was super cute! On our way we drove along the Avenue of the Giants and stopped to hike the Gould Grove Trail. Great way to be introduced to the area. 

 

The kids were starving again so we hit up In N Out, same results it was delicious.

As we got closer to the coast it got cloudier and cloudier. This was definitely a theme by the water! We had one day of super sunny ocean views but usually it looked a lot like this. 

Stopped at this little turnout called Ocean by the Road near Trinidad to get our first good look at the Pacific. That water was freezing!!

After all of the stops we were excited to get out and relax in our spot for three nights. We stayed in a little trailer, but it was mostly RVs and tents in the campground. They had a store, putt putt, ping pong, and pool for us to do which the boys loved. 

We were right in the redwoods! It always felt so moody, I loved it!

July 5th 

We woke up early to get going on Saturday. For once we didn't have a really solid plan on what we were doing, we just knew we wanted to go visit the southern part of the redwoods area because we had reservations for Fern Canyon this day.

As we were pulling up to the general area we saw a sign for a hike to some waterfalls-we always love a hike with a purpose so we decided to go. This ended up being one of our favorite hikes of the trip! Trillium Falls was such a beautiful hike and it was not crowded at all when we were there.

Next up was Fern Canyon-I had really been looking forward to this one! You have to drive and drive down pretty rough roads and over a couple of streams in order to get to the parking area. But once you get there, whew was it ever worth it!

Forgot that we saw a coyote along the way :)

Ike had been looking for banana slugs and we found several in this area.

We stayed for about an hour just wandering around. It was very very crowded even with the limiting of people with the reservation system. 

After Fern Canyon we doubled back a little to check out this cool beach we had seen the day before but were too tired to stop. This is Redwood Creek Beach. And we found a visitor center to get the kids' NP passport stamps. The whole time we were in this area I just could not get over how it could be sunny a half mile from the ocean and so cloudy at the beach!

Last stop in the Humboldt area was Lady Bird Johnson Grove. This was a pretty popular trail and had some really cool trees. Super easy stroll which was nice after all of our adventures this day!

Josh and the kids spied this pizza food truck earlier so we stopped to snag one. It was crazy good! Mojo Pizza in Orick. 

One last stop for this jam-packed day! Klamath River Overlook was something that kept popping up when I was doing my research. We stayed about 5 minutes from here so it was easy to go check it out.  Beautiful, definitely worth going up to. As usual it was a little overcast but the sun peeked through a little.

July 6th

Our last day in the redwoods was spent in the northern section, mostly in Jedidiah State Park. We tried to hike the Grove of Titans but it was closed, so we went straight to Stout Grove instead.  I took way too many pictures of trees on this trip. Sorry for the overload!

We kinda stumbled onto the Smith River. And ended up back at it later in the day!

We also hiked a portion of the Boy Scout Grove Trail.

At this point we needed food and Josh and the kids had a barbecue place picked out in Crescent City.

That was some of the best bbq we have ever had! This guy that was hanging out where we ate told us about this swimming hole nearby, so we headed over there after lunch. Ike swam across Smith River which he was very excited about!

We hiked down to Endert Beach, the kids loved climbing around on all the rocks. 

Does it even count as a trip to see giant trees if you don't drive through one?

And finally, back to reality-had to get a little laundry done before we headed to Crater Lake the next morning!

California 2025-San Francisco

Ike chose to visit California for his 6th grade summer vacation. We are all super glad he did, we had such a blast going on this trip!

July 1st

We started out in San Francisco and stayed with Josh's Aunt Amy and Uncle Brad who live about an hour from the city. 

Early morning flight from Chicago.

We hopped in our rental car and headed straight for some sightseeing. Checked out the painted ladies, Lombard Street and then drove over the bridge. We never saw the Golden Gate without clouds, so this ended up being one of the clearer days!

We were of course starving so we stopped at the nearest In N Out-man it was delicious!!

We finished our loop and headed to Amy and Brad's. Ike was so excited to have a couple of dogs to hang out with!

July 2nd

The next morning we hopped on the BART to take us back into the city. We got out on Embarcadero and then walked everywhere from that point.

The last bite of a breakfast empanada from the wharf.

Next we decided that Coit Tower looked super close and reasonable to walk to. Well it was a pretty walk, but not so reasonable!

So many stairs and we weren't even to the tower yet!

Ike and I braved the last bit of stairs to go to the top.

On the way back down to the bay we came across Freddie's Sandwiches so we stopped in for a sub. It was so good!

Next up was walking along the piers. We stopped to see the sea lions-those things were so fascinating to watch!

Then it was finally time for our Alcatraz tour. This was one all of us were super looking forward to and it did not disappoint!

It was super sunny facing away from the Golden Gate and extremely overcast looking towards it!

We hiked down to the Ghiradelli Square for a sundae then decided to take a Waymo to China Town for a snack.

We went to  Hon's Wun-Tun House to try the scallion pancake and get soup dumplings. The dumplings were sooooo spicy but everyone else loved them and the pancake was bomb!

Back on the BART to head home for the night. We got burritos from a local place in Pleasanton for dinner since we didn't have time to stop at the Mission.

July 3rd

The next day I hung out and went around Pleasanton a little with Aunt Amy (and did some much needed grocery shopping to prepare for the rest of the trip!) while the guys all went golfing. They went to Lake Chabot Golf Course-it looked so beautiful!

Josh's cousin Alex came by to hang out and we roasted some s'mores in their backyard that evening.

Friday morning (July 4th) we got going pretty early and drove up to the Redwoods with a couple of stops along the way!