Four day camping + hiking trip in northern California’s Redwoods National Park

Note: This is a long post with a lot of photos! 

Since moving to Oregon a decade ago, I’ve managed to visit the Redwoods in northern California twice. But each visit was far too short, without time to do any hiking or exploring the area. After spending one night at Elk Prairie campground last year on the way to Yosemite, I knew that I wanted to come back for a longer stay.

This year, I planned a four day return trip with a lot of hiking on the agenda. Three friends and I began the 6-1/2 hour drive from Portland on a Thursday morning in mid-May. We were hoping to beat the crowds and also hoping that it wouldn’t rain the entire time we were there. While it didn’t rain the entire time, it did rain the last two nights of our trip. But it held off during the days when we were hiking, so we felt lucky.

We had two campsites at Elk Prairie campground, which is located in the Prairie Creek part of the Redwoods National Park. Our campsites were next to Prairie Creek.

For this trip, I was planning to bring my one person backpacking tent, but I decided to use my REI Half Dome 2 Plus instead. It’s the first time I used this solo and I loved having the extra space. For me, this is living large while camping.

Day 2

The first thing I saw when I got out of my tent in the morning was a male elk casually munching on undergrowth in our campsite. He slowly made his way along the road, walking through the campground as if it was part of his regular routine. We knew better than to try to approach him, so we just watched and felt lucky to have experienced a bit of wildlife right at our campsite.

Fern Canyon hike

We planned to do a hike to Fern Canyon, and while it is possible to do a loop hike from the campground, it would be a long day of about 12 miles with over 1,000 ft. gain. We wanted to save energy to do a short hike later in the day, and a longer hike the next day, so we decided to drive to the Fern Canyon trailhead at Gold Bluffs Beach.

On the drive there, we passed the appropriately named “Elk Meadow Day Use Area”. There is no fencing to keep the elk here, but obviously they love this meadow. We saw about 20 elk grazing, paying no attention to us or anyone else who stopped to take photos.

We were early in the season for the Fern Canyon hike. They add seasonal bridges in June, and we were here before Memorial Day, so we knew that we would be fording the creek for much of this hike. We were prepared for the conditions, with two of us wearing waterproof socks with trail running shoes.

signage at the Fern Canyon trailhead

new growth on a sword fern

If we had taken the John Irvine trail from our campsite, this is where it meets the Fern Canyon trail.

the beginning of Fern Canyon

wading through the creek

After the first 15 minutes, my feet were completely numb from the coldness of the water so I stopped and put on my wool hiking socks and then put the waterproof socks over them. Much better! One of my friends wore waterproof hiking boots and managed to keep them dry for most of the hike until she plunked her boot into a deeper pool in the creek, with the water going over the top of her boots.

There were a few spots with a lot of downed trees. Instead of attempting to climb over them, the ranger had advised us to go around on the sides. There were obvious paths to follow, so it wasn’t difficult.

The stairs in the photo below lead to a trail that makes a loop back to the start of Fern Canyon. However, we wanted to continue hiking through the canyon as far as we could go. The hike in was so amazing that we preferred to go back the same way so we could continue the unique experience.

I’m not sure how many times we crossed the creek to reach the trail on the other side, but it was a lot.

heading back out of the canyon

Short hike on the Prairie Creek and Foothill Trails

After Fern Canyon, we headed back to camp and did a short hike on the Prairie Creek and Foothill Trails. There were very few people until we crossed the road and were near the “Big Tree”.

The trail from the campground to the Visitors Center has some of the largest trees in the park.

the campground amphitheater

Redwoods Access Trail near the campsite

we are tiny next to these trees!

this is one of the largest nurse logs I’ve ever seen… it’s like a 6 ft high wall

majestic forest

All of the trails that we hiked had good signage, so it was easy to figure out which way to go at junctions.

Prairie Creek Visitors Center

The “Big Tree” is big indeed.

roots

There are so many cool bridges in the Redwoods! The one below wrapped around two large trees.

oxalis

that’s me looking up at the giant trees

Prairie Creek Trail

dense canopy of tall trees

walking amongst the giants

there were several cut outs like this one that we walked under

another awesome bridge!

heading back to camp

Day 3

We saved the longest hike for last – a loop that starts on the Rhododendron Trail and connects to the Foothill Trail via the rugged South Fork Trail. The park ranger told us this hike is known as an “ankle breaker”, so it was perfect for avid hikers who wanted to take a less traveled trail.

Rhododendron Trail signage

oxalis-lined path

dense forest

Parts of this area looked like a jungle.

interesting trail signage

I think these are lilies.

fairy tale land

oxalis and maidenhair ferns

big trees on the Rhododendron Trail

there were a lot of trees with hollowed-out bases

the trail went through this tree

banana slug!

this was the halfway point on our hike

at our lunch spot, this is the end of the Cal Barrel Road

ferns lined the trail all through the hike

yet another cool bridge, this one has an A-frame truss

that’s a loooong nurse log

This is the trail: on top of a log suspended above the ground. I had to do a double take. It was so much fun to walk across.

a small stream crossing with a cascading waterfall

the rugged forest

I heart rustic bridges

Whenever I’m camping or backpacking, I always enjoy taking photos at dusk as the light changes. These photos were taken at our campsites.