Arcly and Elo 2018 - The Lost Coast Trail

We haven't posted anything here in a year! It's been a busy year, and a lot has happened. We've done lots of learning, adventuring, and not blogging, but we still managed to pull off our annual Arcly and Elo trip. This year is our seventh!

Arcly was hosting this year and is still in California, so we stuck to the west coast and did the Lost Coast Trail in northern Cali between September 14th and 16th. I assumed that because it was California it would be jam packed and busy, complete with movie stars and homeless encampments. But in fact there were just a handful of hikers who started the trail with us, and we were alone to enjoy the beautiful coastline most of the way. 

We started bright and early Friday morning in the Black Sands parking lot, where we got picked up by the shuttle from Lost Coast Adventure Tours. The shuttle ride took about an hour and a half and was perfectly decent. 

Black sands beach on the morning of our departure. 

We started the trail at (I'm guessing here) 10:30am (?), and we knew we were in for some bad luck with the tides. There is an impassable high tide section between the start of the trail at Mattole beach and our first destination, Randall Creek. The hiking window for us along that stretch was going to close at 1pm, and we knew we were not going to make it through the 4 mile high tide stretch before then. And we definitely didn't want to rush, because we weren't alone on the beach. 

Arcly with a colony of elephant seals. Arcly is the one in the front - the one with the blue bag. To the right of the frame. 

We were lucky to spot (what I believe to be?) California's northernmost colony of elephant seals, who were lounging in the sand by the lighthouse. The sighting prompted us to give up on the possibility of pushing our luck with the tides, and to just sit and relax awhile. The females were generally inactive, save the occasional stretch and scratch or a scamper away from a male. The young males were jockeying for their position in the social hierarchy, near as we could tell, and seemed to do so by leaning against each other and stretching themselves out to see who is taller, much like Arcly and me. That's how we came to agree that I would be the dominant female if we ever get a harem of males together. 

The laziest form of fighting I have ever seen. They literally lean into each other, stretch up as tall as they can, and drift off into sleep. Eventually they seem to remember they are fighting, shake themselves awake, and groan at each other. 

We were caught on the northern side of the impassable section for a few hours, so we got down to the serious business of eating. 

A pretty good looking trail lunch. We brought shelf stable sausage, small packages of olives, and a package of sundried tomatoes (dry, not in oil). All available from Trader Joes

That first day on the trail we passed through some upland stretches and learned about the real danger of the Lost Coast Trail: Poison Oak. It's everywhere. See how Arcly is wearing shorts in the below picture? Don't do that. We both wore shorts because we come from Canada where only the animals want to hurt you, not the plants. So, take our advice. DO. NOT. WEAR. SHORTS. We bathed with soap after that first day and neither of us had a reaction, but don't take the chance, and do take to heart our warning. Poison Oak is everywhere.

Arcly surveying the coast from an upland stretch of the trail.

After lunch and after letting the tide drop for awhile, we picked our way through the impassable-at-high-tide section and found our way to Randall Creek, a very picturesque little camp spot.

The amazing geology along the Lost Coast Trail. Makes the coastal hike very different from anything you can do in BC. 

Cormorants take off from their poopy perch as we pick our way to Randall Creek.

Our campsite at Randall Creek.

The next morning we got up pretty early and headed off, but not before we spent some time watching a family of otters get on with their morning routing.

A family of river otters at Randall Creek

We were undecided on whether we would stop at Miller Flats or push on through the next impassable section. We had been advised that the last day is mostly beach walking so is quite difficult, and pushing past Miller flats for the second night might be a good idea. Additionally, our tide schedule was bad - the low tide for the following morning was supposed to be around 3ft, which is supposedly the cutoff for doing the next impassable stretch. It seemed to make sense to push through that section today, if possible.

For the first bit of the second day, we stuck to the beach rather than taking the upland trail. That's the funny thing about the Lost Coast Trail. There is an upland trail for quite a bit of it, and if you want to cover a lot of ground, you can just stay off the beach. But then how do you get to poke dead things?

Our first poke-able dead thing, and possibly our second elephant seal sighting?

That second day ended up being pretty foggy, and a good mix of beach walking and upload trail (aka poison oak maze) walking.

Dropping down onto the beach for some pebbly walking.

Walking the upland trail. It doesn't look like their would be much poison oak danger here, but trust us. There is!

By the time we got to Miller Flats we were pretty exhausted by the beach walking we had elected to do. We hummed over whether to go on. Other hikers we had met along the way decided they didn't want to risk the high low tide the following morning, and decided they would push on after the late-afternoon high tide of today. Arcly and I figured we quite liked Miller Flats, then Arcly poured some whiskey and it was decided. We'd risk the tide the next morning.

Dinner on our second night. A rehydrated chickpea tagine. I'll put the recipe in a separate post. 

We had a great night at Miller Flats watching rich people fly in on their private planes to surf for a couple of hours. We got up early the next day to make the most of the falling tide, since we knew it wouldn't fall too far. Online resources said that the upcoming 4 mile stretch of trail was impassable above 3 ft, and we knew that our low tide was supposed to be just below 3 ft. To be honest, it was never a problem. There were a couple of sections we had to hop around, but otherwise it was completely passable, and we felt pretty smug about our decision to not push through in the dark.

Last day of hiking on the Lost Coast Trail.

Overall, a great trip. My bits of advice: 1) wear pants, 2) do it in four days, not three! With just three days to do it, you end up electing to do the upland trail more often to save time, and then you cut your beach time short. Which is too bad, because there is lots of good poking to do on the beach.

Arcly and Elo (reversed), still going strong. <3