The
northcoast of California offers some of the most picturesque drives
that you will find anywhere in the world. Starting from the Big Lagoon,
the drive along Highway
101
to Crescent City leads you past spectacular
coastal scenery and verdurous redwood forests. The stretch of the
highway beginning at False Klamath Cove and rising nearly a thousand
feet above the shimmering blue Pacific Ocean, before its swings into a
thicket of towering redwoods.
Another
impressively scenic Northcoast drive is Mattole
Road,
which branches
off from the Avenue of Giants and leisurely winds its way through the
giant redwoods of Bull Creek Flats, before rising over a ridge nearly
3,000 feet high and descending through several charming valleys,
peppered with ranch houses and a couple of small towns. Finally, it
makes its way to the Lost Coast and Cape Mendocino, the most western
portion of California. From this point, it climbs back into a ridge of
high hills, alternately offering stunning coastal views on the one
side, or stunning interior views of distant mountains and the Eel River
Valley on the other.
If
we turn our attention in a southerly direction, another scenic drives
begins at the northernmost commencement of California
Highway
One, the famous coastal
road that traverses some of the finest ocean front scenery in the
world. Splitting off from Highway 101 just south of the Humboldt County
line, it takes off through a treacherous, winding forest for six
grueling miles, until it sweeps to the coast, passing through a series
of charming coastal towns, including the most famous and charming of
all, Mendocino.
To
view photo albums of these scenery taken along these northcoast
roads,
click on the links below:
