Camping At Limekiln
Here's the crew (that's the Jackson & Edgar families) hiking away from Limekiln Falls - it gives you an idea of how amazing this hike was... for more information about Limekiln State Park, check out the "official" website and/or the Redwood Hikes website.
The park is named for the four limekilns that are at the end of a 3/4 mile trail... for a few years in the late part of the 19th century, this was a money-making operation. In the 1960's, this was (according to the guitar-playing record producer who camped not too far from us) Ground Zero for hippies & all that entailed. Now it's a state park where part of the campground is almost on the beach and part of it is in a coastal redwood forest.
Collin had spent some time showing me the map... and now he's in a hurry to catch up with everyone else.
It's very hard to get a good "serious" picture of Braeden - this is the best of a number I tried to take during our trip. He had a blast, adventuring with his friend Matthew. They waded in the surf, got wet in the creek behind our campsite & even played Poohsticks with Matthew's little sister, Meghan.
Collin was a little left out at Limekiln Falls - he's still not great at balancing and the older kids were heading across some pretty slippery rocks in the creek - so he & I went down the creek just a bit & sat together. I've got some pictures where we're looking at the camera... but I like this one best - it seems the most natural. (BTW, Limekiln Falls is very difficult to photograph... it spills 100 feet down a limestone face at the end of a very thin canyon. It's beautiful but tough to capture.)
Out at the beach, Collin made a stingray. See if you can find it!
Both boys (and Dad!) did a lot of rock climbing on the beach... the same creek that ran behind our campsite pours into the ocean through these boulders. Pretty cool, eh?!
Speaking of our campsite, this is the view of the back side of it from the bridge over the creek. The green & white tent in the left of the photo is ours. (It was wonderful to fall asleep to the water splashing over the rocks.)
This final picture was taken on the way home at Ragged Point, CA... while Shari rested in the car (she does NOT like driving on Hwy 1, esp. when she's fighting some kind of flu bug!), the boys & I went exploring. A nice lady took our picture in the wedding gazebo. Yes, we look ragged (Ragged Pt, get it?!) - but by this time we'd all been 2+ days without a shower.
A final note or three:
- The Edgar Family (Kirt, Vickie, Matthew & Meghan) were wonderful folks to go camping with... we somehow managed to combined good eating, time to play (the Edgar kids taught me Sleeping Queens), extensive discussions of theology & music & parenting & (whadda ya know!) John Steinbeck along with hiking, playing in the surf & pounding tent stakes into pretzels. When some of you ask me about why we homeschool, people like the Edgar family are a big reason for that!
- I can't recommend Limekiln State Park highly enough for a camping getaway... but know that the campground fills up on weekends - which, btw, is another good reason for homeschooling. (Better scheduling for vacations/field trips!) The campgrounds have showers & restrooms (Mark is NOT a fan of pit toilets) but no electricity at the sites. The sites are not large (they vary in size) but would work well for one family. We really liked #18 (where we were) and thought the creekside sites in the upper redwood area would have been nice, too.
- The only caveat for Limekiln is it's location: if you do not like curvy roads, this is not the trip for you. It's about 1/2 way between San Simeon & Carmel, which means coming from north or south you've got to traverse the twisty parts of Highway 1. I love that kind of drive - it makes Shari ill.
Here's the crew (that's the Jackson & Edgar families) hiking away from Limekiln Falls - it gives you an idea of how amazing this hike was... for more information about Limekiln State Park, check out the "official" website and/or the Redwood Hikes website.
The park is named for the four limekilns that are at the end of a 3/4 mile trail... for a few years in the late part of the 19th century, this was a money-making operation. In the 1960's, this was (according to the guitar-playing record producer who camped not too far from us) Ground Zero for hippies & all that entailed. Now it's a state park where part of the campground is almost on the beach and part of it is in a coastal redwood forest.
Collin had spent some time showing me the map... and now he's in a hurry to catch up with everyone else.
It's very hard to get a good "serious" picture of Braeden - this is the best of a number I tried to take during our trip. He had a blast, adventuring with his friend Matthew. They waded in the surf, got wet in the creek behind our campsite & even played Poohsticks with Matthew's little sister, Meghan.
Collin was a little left out at Limekiln Falls - he's still not great at balancing and the older kids were heading across some pretty slippery rocks in the creek - so he & I went down the creek just a bit & sat together. I've got some pictures where we're looking at the camera... but I like this one best - it seems the most natural. (BTW, Limekiln Falls is very difficult to photograph... it spills 100 feet down a limestone face at the end of a very thin canyon. It's beautiful but tough to capture.)
Out at the beach, Collin made a stingray. See if you can find it!
Both boys (and Dad!) did a lot of rock climbing on the beach... the same creek that ran behind our campsite pours into the ocean through these boulders. Pretty cool, eh?!
Speaking of our campsite, this is the view of the back side of it from the bridge over the creek. The green & white tent in the left of the photo is ours. (It was wonderful to fall asleep to the water splashing over the rocks.)
This final picture was taken on the way home at Ragged Point, CA... while Shari rested in the car (she does NOT like driving on Hwy 1, esp. when she's fighting some kind of flu bug!), the boys & I went exploring. A nice lady took our picture in the wedding gazebo. Yes, we look ragged (Ragged Pt, get it?!) - but by this time we'd all been 2+ days without a shower.
A final note or three:
That looks fantastic! Will keep it in mind if we're that way again (I'm in the UK). I was in CA last year, and drove from San Francisco up to Eureka mostly on hwy1, it is so beautiful! But fairly hairy in places!
ReplyDeleteoh, should say hi! We are a Home-educating boardgaming family from across the pond :)
ReplyDeleteMy pictures do not do it justice, em... it's well worth your time.
ReplyDeleteHow common is homeschooling in England?
well, since we live and breath the HE community it feels pretty normal to me! But in reality it's not very common at all, compared to the number of kids in school, most people don't even realise it is an option. That said, it seems to be on the up as people become more dissolutioned with the schooling system here. We don't have compulsory monitoring, so there aren't any real figures as to how many of us there are!
ReplyDelete