Crescent City, California

It didn't take the kids and I long to get ourselves together and get back on the road.  One quick stop for some fancy coffee drinks (travel day tradition...any excuse for some caffeine, ya'll!) and we set our sights south...back to California!  Say whaaaat???  California?  After all that talk about seeing Oregon?  Hahaha...yes, California was calling to us that morning.  So we went :)!  Why not, right?  Right.  So anyway, away we went all caffeined up down to Crescent City, California.

Just so ya'll know, we weren't just aimlessly going around in circles.  We did actually have a destination in mind in Crescent City.  I have mentioned before that we really enjoy the National Parks Junior Ranger program and the kids have collected quite a few badges from our travels around the country (around 200 at last count!).  We spent a good chunk of time the day before in Redwood National Park, but the visitor center in the forest was closed for the season.  With Dan and Trevor off on the Chetco for the day, the 4 younger kids and I decided to zip back down into California for some junior rangering at the Crescent City Redwood NP visitor center.

The visitor center was fun, the rangers all friendly and cheerful.  We learned even more about the park and the history of the area...banana slugs, fire activated pine cones, and the gigantic earthquake/tsunami of 1964...

that blue line just above the boys heads...tsunami high water mark {{shiver}}

Only a block or so away was a really nice waterfront park.  We headed over there next to check out the Crescent Harbor...

From there, we noticed a lighthouse in the distance.  I just love lighthouses, so of course we had to get a closer look :)...

We got close and then realized that it sits on an island!  How neat is that??!  There is a road leading to it and it is actually open to the public...but only at low tide :).  We would just have to be content with viewing from afar on this day (some interesting history about the light here)...

With our path to the light cut off, we turned back around towards the harbor.  There was a fishing pier that grabbed our attention so we headed thatta way next.  What we saw over there...WHOA.  There was a real strange fella out there communing with his bird brethren.  Ahem.  Yeah, for real...

Bird Man standing near his camper...

We watched as a car drove by... not really fast, but fast enough that it scared away all "his birds" and he completely FREAKED out.  Screaming, wailing, all manner of carrying on.  We eased on by real slow when he wasn't looking (eeek!)...

...that poor woman looked too scared to move ;)

Before leaving the harbor, we made one last stop over on the far side.  There is a little restaurant that looks out over the water (and the seals swimming, boats coming and going) so we decided to grab some lunch.  The food was just ok, the view however was awesome...so overall it was a good lunch.  Not great, but good. 

When we were in the vc, the ranger told us about a place we could go to maybe see some elk.  Elk at the beach?  Say no more :)!  Even though it would take us further south into California (the opposite direction we were supposed to be going), we just had to go check it out...

...aaaannnnd boom.  Fog bank. 

Don't get me wrong, I love the fog and mist.  It's a part of what makes the west coast what it is (and oh so pretty).  Fog is nice when you are walking on the beach or just hanging out, but not for spotting elk (or anything else).  So...we went just a bit farther and decided to turn around and head back.  We were driving along and out of the corner of my eye...something brown!  Screech!  Baaaaack up...it was a field full of elk!  Well how about that :)...