Last Coast Trail

Saturday, June 14, at 7am on the dot, the Shaw’s and Scott Wood started our trek to Cowboy Camp. The Grimsley’s and Thompson’s (long time ago members) were going to meet us at Usal Beach on Sunday. We made great time and decided to change our camp location to Indian Valley Reservoir. What a great “off the beaten path” camp site this was. Right next to the Reservoir and clean, with flushing toilets.

Sunday morning Matt realized we packed the wrong stove and the one we packed needed a new plunger seal and said “any general or convenience store should have one.” We headed west on Hwy 20 to Hwy 101, stopping at all hardware/camping stores and nothing. We gave up, but it chewed away a lot of our day, but we found a nice park in Ukiah and had lunch. We took Hwy 20 to Fort Bragg and up Hwy 1 to Usal Road. About halfway up Hwy 1 Sheryl Thompson messaged us that they were in Fort Bragg. We came across a lot of traffic on Usal Road, found Mary & Jerry, and started setting up camp. Knowing the Thompsons (Barry, Lynne and Sheryl) were “not far” behind us, we had Mary & Jerry wait at the bridge for them. No luck … Matt hopped in the Jeep and went out on the beach to see if he could find them. Thankfully he did and didn’t have to make his way back down Usal Road. We enjoyed an evening around a campfire.

Monday morning Lynne Thompson wasn’t feeling well, so Barry & Lynne departed from us early that morning. Jerry had gotten word from the campers next to them Saturday night that the Usal Road between Usal Beach and Shelter Cove was rough. They said even with vehicles like Scott and ours it would take all day to get to Shelter Cove. Sheryl has a well-equipped JK and stayed with us, but Jerry & Mary went back down Usal Road to Hwy 1 and drove around on pavement. They were skunked. The road wasn’t smooth, but definitely not as horrible as Jerry was told. They could have made it in the XTerra.

We departed Usal Beach and headed along the Lost Coast Trail to Needle Point Visitor Center and enjoyed a packed lunch. From Needle Point we continued on to Shelter Cove. We got there before Jerry & Mary.

At Shelter Cove we set up camp, some explored the Black Sands Beach, others walked down to see the Sea Lions. We enjoyed a dinner at the local deli and campfire in camp before heading off to bed.

Tuesday morning, after packing and picking up after our visitors, we made great time heading to A.W. County Park for lunch. We enjoyed lunch, played in the river a bit and decided we would check out Mattole Beach Campground. and if it wasn’t as nice, we would come back and camp here. Mattole Beach is a great beach if you are self-contained (packed your own bathroom); they have one, but it is a way to walk and some of us didn’t want to walk that far from camp. There also wasn’t a great group site to choose so we took pictures of the beach and then wandered back toward A.W. County Park. On the way back I saw a BLM placard that seemed to have access to the Mattole River. We poked our nose in and found a great place along the river that could be a cool place to camp, except for the large rocks. A.W. County Park had flushing toilets and showers. We enjoyed a campfire, a little campfire game and cobbler (thanks again, Sheryl).

Wednesday, we decided it would be more of a “travel at your own pace” kind of day. We had a lot of scenic and photo opportunities to stop and take in. We travelled from along the coast line and through the small town of Ferndale to Hwy 101 to Avenue of the Giants.

We dropped Mary & Jerry, and Sheryl off in Ferndale to shop and enjoy the gingerbread Victorian houses. Scott and the Shaw’s found a gas station, and I noticed a unique yarn sign on a window. I grabbed my purse, jumped out of the Jeep, looked at Matt, pointed at the window. However they were closed, bummer… but as we pulled out I noticed a vehicle with the same logo pulling up. “STOP! Ask that man if they are opening.” They were. YES! The kids and I with Scott wandered into the shop to find ourselves in a warehouse were they make yarn from sheep, rabbit, and other animals from the locals. What a neat experience.

After shopping, we drove to Hidden Springs Campground and figured out our campsites. We then took a short drive along the Avenue of the Giants and after realizing they wouldn’t let dogs on many of the trails, we drove to the visitor center and then took a trip to a small town called Miranda for dinner to go. At this point we were all getting tired. The Grimsley’s and Sheryl found camp and ended up changing camp sites due to the weird slopes and walking paths to the tent location. We all agreed, unless we couldn’t find anything else, we would not go to Hidden Springs again. Oh, Scott found his glasses at this point, stuffed in a different sweatshirt pocket.

Thursday we woke up and got an early start to the day’s adventure. We continued down the Avenue of the Giants to Hwy 101. We topped off on gas in Laytonville. We make our lunch stop at Eel River Campground, but found a nice pull off to stop for a bit and let the dogs out. We found M1, which is one of the main dirt road arteries through the Mendocino National Forest and stayed on that for 40 miles, until we got to Lake Pillsbury. The views were great. I feel the forest here is much greener than our local forest. We made camp at Oak Camp next to Lake Pillsbury. The water was low, but was still a pretty sight from camp.

That night we talked and discussed different options. Jerry & Mary were planning on leaving to go visit friends from here. Sheryl was open, but had thoughts about attending Moonlight Madness in the Sierras or go visit a friend in Napa. Scott was game for sticking with us, but we were all getting pretty worn out and decided to bail from our last day plans and head back to Indian Valley Reservoir, which would put us home a little earlier on Saturday.

Friday we woke up, packed up and parted ways. By morning we had a new plan; head toward Tahoe and camp near Markleeville. Then, I found out Scott’s air bed had a hole, plus, there were Red Flag warnings for the eastern side of the Sierras and a fire broke out in Gardnerville, which we would have to pass through. Ugh, okay we thought about it, waded through a couple options and decided to barrel down and head home. We made it home about 10pm.

This trip took a lot of planning & I’m glad we didn’t have to adjust more than the few times we did. Timing was the hardest part of this trip. But, all in all, everyone had a great time.