Day 53 – We got up 7:30; 45 degrees, cloudy & foggy. Lots of rain was coming, & we had our coffee & got ready to depart for our next campground. The girls seemed a little confused; they’d gotten used to relaxing & lying around. They sensed with our activity that they’d soon be on the road again. We’re going to Klamath, 40 miles south & west of here, near the coast & the redwood trees.
40 miles
Almost ready to leave, Rob was making a final sweep of the campsite to make sure we weren’t leaving anything behind. He’d told me we’d be leaving momentarily and that I’d be following him in the Honda until we found a more level place to hook the car up to the RV. I settled down to wait until he gave me the word to move the car. I heard voices, I looked in the side mirror, & saw Rob talking to someone who looked pretty scruffy. I waited & waited; the man talked & talked, and finally Rob came back inside. Turns out that a man walked by Rob on his way to the trash cans. He stopped & started talking to Rob. He was animated, hyper and was talking quite fast. Kept apologizing & saying it was just so good to talk to someone, he hadn’t seen anyone in months. He’d been up in the mountains looking for gold. Did he find any? No, but he sure was glad to be around people again. Glad Rob was there to help him out…..
Okay then, we finally got our entourage going, running later than we’d hoped. We found a level place to hook up the vehicles and completed our routine of doing the safety check of all the lights & flashers & blinkers that we always do before we leave to drive the RV. Oh dear, there’s a headlight out on the front passenger side. Rob, being the super-prepared camper that he is, had a spare headlight, so he proceeded to change the light. Of course at that precise time, it seemed we were blocking some other campers from being able to leave. And then the lady with the two dogs whom we’d talked to the day before came over to say good-bye, and her partner came up to ask Rob some questions about our bike rack because someone had stolen one of their bikes & they wanted to get a new bike rack. More delays, and we were more than ready to hit the road finally at 11:25 a.m. It had started raining, 51 degrees.
Panther Flat Campground, Smith River National Recreation Area Forest Service Campground,
Gasquet, CA 95543, (Highway 199 east from Highway 101 thru the small town of Gasquet, 2.5 miles east of the Visitor’s Center, at milepost 16.75), (707) 457-3131, https://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/srnf/recarea/?recid=11445. Some campsites are reservable in advance, campground is open all year, in late October, 1 loop is closed for the winter, and still there were plenty of open sites to choose from. We had site #8 above the Smith River. The sites closer to the highway can hear traffic noise; near the River it is drowned out mostly by the water sounds. No hook-ups, no dump station. Water is available at spigots in the campground, but you are not allowed to hook your hose up to them directly to the RV. A very nice, quiet campground, surrounded by trees, some of them redwoods. A beautiful setting, peaceful. There is room between sites & most are divided by trees and/or brush. The loop that was closed (near the highway) had larger sites which could fit bigger RV’s & their tow cars. Our site just fit our RV & car, but we also had plenty of room to put up the screened tent in front of the RV & there was also space on the side. $15.00 per night; with the senior pass it’s $7.50. We would stay here again, definitely. There was a very nice Day Use Area below the campground right on the Smith River with tall, forested cliffs rising directly above the other side of the River. Beautiful! Trails led from the campground to the Area or it could be accessed by paved road from the campground.
We had an uneventful but rainy drive to Klamath Camper Corral, arriving at 12:35 p.m. It was 54 degrees; it was raining hard. We chose site #97, in a little ways from the entrance about halfway from the office to the Klamath River which ran right by the campground. All the campsites in the 50 acre Park were on a large grassy field, beautiful landscaping, very park-like. We had nice trees next to us; our campsite pad was concrete which was nice because of all the rain. There were very few concrete pads. Full hook-ups, YAAAA, and we dumped the tanks, filled with fresh water, & unpacked. $27.50 per night with Passport America (50% off).
Klamath, CA sits at the mouth of the Klamath River, which stretches 263 miles through OR into CA & empties into the Pacific Ocean, making it the 2nd largest river in California. It is known for its world-class fishing – salmon & trout. It’s just minutes from Redwood National Park with beautiful drives through groves of old redwood trees & many hiking trails. Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park nearby is the home to a herd of Roosevelt Elk, and Klamath has the tourist attractions of the Trees of Mystery, the Drive-thru Tree, & the Klamath River Jet Boat Tours. Very close to the campground we saw a sign which said it was the previous site of the city of Klamath. We found out that in 1955, a flood washed much of the town down the Klamath River & out into the Ocean. The people rebuilt, only to have the 1964 Thousand-Year Flood hit the area, obliterating the town. This time fewer people stayed to rebuild.
Meanwhile, back at the campground, we had lunch & relaxed the rest of the day. There were maybe 10 other sites filled, none of them close to us. The girls were happy to have their heated pads back on; we were happy to be settled in again.