This past Memorial Day weekend Doug and I hiked the Lost Coast with Erin, Liz, Molly, Nathan and Quinn. This time to unplug was much needed after juggling a busy few months at work with my first semester of grad school.
The lost coast is appropriately named because it is the most remote and undeveloped portion of the California coastline. Many stretches of the coast are impassable at high tide, so hikers must carry a tide chart and make sure to not enter an impassable area at the wrong time. Needless to say, flexibility is key when planning your hike along the coast.
We decided to do the stretch from Mattole Beach (north end) to Black Sands Beach in Shelter Cove, CA, making a nice 25 mile hike along the coast. On Thursday night we picked up Molly and Nathan at the Sacramento and started our drive up to Shelter Cove. We stayed the night in Willits to get a few hours of sleep and woke up at 4am to finish the drive and make our shuttle time of 7 AM. Taking a shuttle is the easiest way, in my opinion, to do this trip. You park your car at Black Sands Beach, where you finish, and have a service shuttle you up to the trailhead, which is a windy one and a half hour drive.
Day One:
We started at Mattole Beach trailhead and hiked till Randall Creek, about 9 miles total. This day we saw a variety of terrain, from sand to dirt trails to large rocks. We were also learning about the high tide times and how to navigate the "impassable areas". We found that many of these areas can be crossed during high tide as long as you are okay with getting a little wet. There were also many creeks and bluffs where we could retreat to during high tide.
About 3.7 miles in we reached Punta Gorda light house. Just below this on the beach there was a group of sea lions lounging on the beach.
We decided to stick the to the trail on the bluffs instead of hugging the beach. Sand and rocks along the coast were much more strenuous to hike.
Around 5.7 miles in we hit Sea Lion Gulch and decided to split up from Erin and Liz. We were entering an impassable zone during high tide are and Liz and Erin wanted to play it safe since they had Quinn. Molly, Nathan, Doug and I moved on to see how far we could get before need to seek higher ground. We ended up having to take a three hour break on the bluff in the picture above until high tide passed.
After our break, we hiked our final stretch to Randall Creek, where we agreed to meet Erin and Liz to set up camp. The campsite was beautiful, however it was the coldest and windiest night, making it hard to sleep.
We made dinner down by the creek. Notice Molly falling out of her chair about while Liz remains unfazed chugging wine :)
Day Two:
We woke up tired from the lack of sleep the night before, but excited to hit the trail. During day two we hiked from Randall Creek to Shipman Creek, another 9 miles.
Breakfast at Randall Creek the next morning. We we thrilled to wake up to sunny, blue skies and less wind than the day before.
Off we go! Like day one, we decided to stay on the bluffs as much as possible.
Using landmarks to figure out where we are.
Yoga breaks :)
We hiked past a house that had its own plane as a way to get to and from the Lost Coast.
At this point the trail made its way down to the beach. The views were spectacular!
That's a whale! We saw fifteen whales over our three day hike.
The beach outside of Shipman Creek.
We arrived at Shipman Creek around 3 PM and set up camp. This was my favorite campsite. Our tents looked right over the water.
Liz made pizza from scratch!
Quinn was feeling sore after day two. He had enough of walking on sand and crawled up on Doug's lap.
After washing camp dinner dishes with Molly.
Day Three:
Our last day on the coast was bittersweet. We were all excited to shower and not carry our packs anymore, but as I walked our last 7 miles I was already sad to leave the beauty and peaceful quiet of the beach. This last stretch was all along the coast. Our legs were feeling the burn as we arrived to Black Sands Beach.
This deer greeted us on the beach as we woke up on day three.
Another day of beautiful clear blue skies. We couldn't have asked for better weather.
About three miles in Quinn eventually had enough. His paws were hurting from the sand so Liz put him in her pack. Erin took some of Liz's load. They both had a very heavy load to carry for the last four miles of our journey.
Here Molly and I are leaving the beach and making our way to the trail back to the parking lot.
Quinn refused to leave Liz's pack.
We made it!
