The Isolated Lost Coast of California

In my last post I said that we went back to our squatter’s site in Jackson State Forest, just east of Fort Bragg, CA. We were smarter about our second night of “guerrilla camping.” We still got up early and packed up before anything else, but this time we drove straight to the Fort Bragg Dog Park. The place was empty at 7:30AM on a Saturday, so we parked in a corner and set up our tailgate table. I took Bailey and the Chuckit over to the park while Michael worked on coffee and breakfast.

I met a nice lady in the park. She recognized our setup and told us that she and her husband had traveled extensively in Mexico when they were in their 20s. She shared a few great stories, but here’s my favorite:

They were driving this old beater truck, and things kept breaking on it, and they’d fix what they could. The brakes kept getting worse, but they kept putting off the repair because it was costly. Well, one day the brakes finally failed and they almost killed this group of Mexicans. In the end, they sold the truck to the group of said Mexicans, and continued on foot. Hitchhiking.

I hope none of my stories involve near-death for anyone, but it makes me so happy that I’ll have great travel stories to tell when I get older. It seems like more days than not the universe gives me confirmation that Michael and I made the right decision with this trip.

Onward, then, to King Range NCA. The drive north from Fort Bragg was beautiful. We stopped early on so I could photograph this trestle bridge over Pudding Creek.

King Range was a gamble – we didn’t know anything about it, other than it was managed by the BLM, and didn’t find any reviews of their campsites – but this time our gamble paid off. This place was gorgeous. Shady and cool, and only 5 miles from the ocean. The sites were clean and level with trash bins and clean bathrooms. (Pit toilets – no running water – but clean nontheless.)

Plus, it was empty. We picked out our site, paid up, left some stuff behind to mark it, and headed for the beach. Black Sand Beach. With this view:

Michael got out his pack for a ruck workout, and I went for a run. Or tried to. This black sand was like nothing I’ve ever run on before. Usually, when you get close to the water, the sand firms up and becomes a nice running surface. Not so at Black Sand Beach, where even the wet sand was soft and loose. My lungs felt great but my ankles and calves were in agony. I walked early, and often. Still, it was such a beautiful area that I couldn’t complain.

We saw a couple of people fishing but other than that we seemed to have this beach to ourselves.

Black Sand Beach is also the southern terminus of the Lost Coast Trail, a 24-mile trip that most people apparently hike in 3 days. They also go with a tide chart in one hand, as several stretches of the Lost Coast Trail are inaccessible at high tide.

Back at camp, we set up the tent and Michael set up the hammock. As I looked through our Revel Gear goodie box, I realized why sending everything to coastal northern California was kind of a mistake. These are solar-powered lights. And there was a definite lack of sunshine at our camp.

Anyway. I was still excited to set up our new lights. Kody said in an interview with SGB Media that she used to haul Christmas lights and a generator on every camping trip, so I went with the multi-color lights in her honor. I love that I can plug up to 2 strings of lights into this handy little charger. (And that the charger can be powered by the sun or through the cigarette lighter in the truck!)

While the Wailaki campground was not full, it was not empty either and several campers walked past our site, commenting on our setup. I mean, the RTT is an anomaly up here anyway, but the lights just took everything to the next level.

In case you were worried, Savory Spice was not left out. Michael made curried chicken and vegetables for dinner, with the help of that Vietnamese Sweet Lemon Curry spice package.

So delicious! And here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

After that fabulous dinner, we sat under our Revel Gear lights and enjoyed the night.