Day 6 2016

Garberville, California...the biggest town to stay in on our route and one of the few to stay in on our route.  We were greeted at the hotel lobby front desk with the clerk telling Harvey, "You're in the back building (of the hotel).  Nice and safe. Nice and safe. This town is five blocks. You can walk and see everything. You blink and you miss it." Hmmm...

Everyone we saw appeared to be retired and on vacation or...well, strung out on drugs. In the hotel that night, we read a description of the town which explained A LOT. "Marijuana cultivation has replaced timber as the economic driver of Garberville and neighboring Redway...the town has been called the marijuana heartland of the U.S. by the BBC News." Oops. The town was weird and crunchy.  Also, a niece let us know that anywhere that has a green peace flag flying is probably a good place to avoid.  Oops again.  No wonder we did not fit in this town!  It actually was sad to see people's faces.  They looked like they lived hard lives without much hope.  

One mystery we still do not understand is this...

A paper towel dispenser outside of our hotel room (and every room)? Just why??!!

After we left the Marijuana Heartland of the U.S., we headed to the Black Sand beach.  There were danger signs everywhere for swimming and sharks.  The water was extremely rough.  We enjoyed exploring the beach area.  The main area we saw was full of pebbles and further down there was black sand.  We saw more oyster shells. Rebekah spotted a whale and Trey saw a starfish! 

Benjamin found parts of a crab.

Oyster shells almost as big as Benjamin's hand!

What goes on behind the scenes for our photos...there are not always people around to take our family photos.  Harvey and Trey are pretty awesome at setting up timers for our pics (and their long legs can run fast enough to make into the photo :).

A gorgeous find and a gorgeous photo taken by Trey!

Another crab shell!

*********

After a quick lunch, we went to the Redwood National Park.  There was a neat beach area by the Visitor Center that was full of driftwood.  This was another great stop for the Junior Park Ranger program.

What is so interesting to me is how the redwoods and the ocean are so close.  In NC, we have three very distinct areas that are the mountains, piedmont, and coast.  They are not intertwined as it all seems to be here!  We took a short family hike on one of the forest trails.  It was almost eerie how quiet it all was, except for the creaking of the trees.  Over and over we all keep mentioning how God's glory is so evident in His creation.                 

Yep, we are a tree hugging family (at least for today 😉)! This is just to show how big these trees are. Crazy!

A family forest photo!

After the Redwood Forest, Harvey, Trey, Benjamin, & Elizabeth took a trail to a spot down by the water. It was a narrow, steep trail.  I stayed in the car with Jonathan & Rebekah who were pretty tired at that point.  The four had fun, but Harvey said it was a workout :).

We ate a yummy seafood dinner at a little town on the coast of California.  There were many loud sea lions who made their residence outside the restaurant!  By the time were done with dinner, they had all barked themselves to sleep!

Note the sea lions in the background!

We have had a lot of car time, and different ones of us have had some car sickness issues and various tummy issues (some of it due in part to eating out so much). As always, hours in the car with the seven of us offers plenty of opportunities for showing grace, listening to each other, and talking. We have had many discussions of everything from what we are learning in our quiet times, favorite sports teams, family genealogy, relationships, future careers, you name it.  Card games have been played. We listen to music and some "Adventures in Odyssey."  Jonathan, Benjamin, & Elizabeth have travel notebooks that I made them before we left with maps of the three states we are driving through, as well as other activity & coloring pages. We do not always get along perfectly, of course, as we are seven very different people.  But we have two pretty big things in common that keep us trying...a deep love for Christ and a deep love for each other.

Our day ended driving into Oregon, our number 47 state!