Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park — Attraction in Crescent City

American Arbor Day

With a little love and support, this little sprout at Prairie Creek Redwood State Park in California has a big future ahead of it. It has the potential to one day be the tallest tree on the planet, or at least close to it. Its ‘big brother,’ Hyperion, currently holds the record at 380 feet. They’re giant sequoias, aka giant redwood trees. They often grow upwards of 300 feet tall and can live for thousands of years. They’re heroes of nature, affecting the weather and climate, while housing and protecting other plants and animals. But all of this little sprout’s potential is at risk because the giant sequoia is an endangered species. Fewer than 80,000 of them remain. That’s why today is an important day for it and all trees.

That’s right, today is Arbor Day, the day where we stop a moment to think about the trees (and hopefully even plant a few). The first American Arbor Day occurred 150 years ago, when an estimated one million trees were planted in Nebraska in 1872. This year, America’s Arbor Day Foundation is celebrating its 50th year of dedication to tree planting. They’ve planted over 350 million of them over the years, but the mission never ends. Trees are vital to the health of our planet, which means they're important for our own health as well. Why not do a little to make the future a better place and take a moment to nurture or plant a...

This is a very large state park. “Big tree” is found here. There are a few different campgrounds in this park. If you hold an Access Pass it costs $17.50 per night to pull into a space, off the original $35 per night. There are no electric hookups in many of the state parks in California. When we showed up late at night the park ranger greeted me from his Rv. He was super nice and helpful. I hated to bug him but he came out to see if I had any questions. We are spoiled from Oregon, where most state parks have electric and water hookups I found it strange that there weren’t any hookups here.

Beyond that, the park was in the beautiful redwoods. We did not camp here, but we came back the next morning to explore the area. They offer many hiking trails. You get redwoods and beach access all in one park. There are signs all over about the wild elk. We went into the visitor center and the lady who normally runs the visitor center was on her break so the park ranger who I met the night before was running the visitor center so she could get her break. It was funny! He was very informative with my four year old on the bones from the elk they had in the center. They offer a park ranger booklet so the little ones can become...

My family and I visited the beach area and the Fern Canyon area. The beach is nice and rustic, no shells but lots of beautiful warm sand and crashing waves. We used one of the picnic tables for our lunch and took a stroll. Fern canyon was amazing. My father and I who are more able hiked around the trails in the area and loved it. My mother who is less able was still okay making the trek into the canyon and felt it was worth the walk. While it is possible to stay out of the water you have to really try, having water shoes makes it much easier ( mom can't scramble over massive tree trunks but she can walk across a stream). The canyon area gets crowded sometimes though and the parking lot wasn't able to handle the after lunch volume. Unfortunately visitors were not very considerate and it was a tight squeeze to get the mini SUV out because folks parked on both sides of a narrow road after spots filled up. There are decent pit toilets at the trail head but one of the door's locks was busted causing a line for the other. Also while dogs are allowed in the park you have to be careful with them near the elk who wander everywhere. (Dogs are not allowed on the trail though as is the case with most...