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But once we recover from these vapors, we have a fairly decent runner-up: the Hammond Trail. No, it’s not decent. It’s magnificent — as long as you hit the Hiller Park section on a day when the wind is not wafting trailward from the wastewater ponds. The Hammond Trail’s wonders include paved and dirt stretches, hills and flats, canopy tunnels and wideopen ocean vistas. You can be rolling on your bicycle past a ball game at the park one moment and, the next, peering between foliage at a pod of sea lions lolling alongside the mouth of the Mad River while seals cavort in the riffling waters. There’s even a pedestrians-only section, which ventures into the green, viney maw of the Widow White Creek drainage. There is no tram. Deal with it. — Heidi Walters The Breakdown: Hammond Trail 20.8%, Fern Canyon 8.5%, Headwaters Forest 6.7%, Arcata Forest 4%, Trinidad Head 3.5%. Category popularity: 28th.
Best Place to Send an Outsider
It’s almost become cliché. Every year we ask, where’s the best place to take your out-of-towners? And every year it’s the same answer: Fern Canyon. Hey, it’s good enough for Steven Spielberg’s CGI dinosaurs (“Jurassic Park II” was partially filmed at Fern Canyon in the late 1990s). But with the canyon’s 50-foot walls covered in ferns that look nearly phosphorescent in daylight, and a pebbled floor beneath a snaking creek inside a dense, moist forest that you can feel in your breath, it’s a beautiful and worthy cliché. Hiking the half-mile trail can feel like a kind of rural gymnastics as you’re forced to cross the creek by slippery wooden planks and fallen trees. The sooner you accept the fact that your socks and shoes are going to get wet, the better off you are. Trying to avoid a wetting invites disaster. Just ask my 50-something-
Staff pick
Best Urban Waterfall There is a spot along Turner Road, on the south edge of downtown McKinleyville, where you can stand in a light-dappled forest and hear the steady, soothing whir of traffic on Highway 101 nearby. Walk a few yards and the sound becomes suddenly brighter, closer, not as compact and forward-sounding. It’s the even more soothing whir of water cascading. Walk to the edge of the narrow country lane and you’ll see it: a short path that drops precipitously downward and, suspended among the leafy black-andgreen, a frothing whiteness. A waterfall! Right next to the Mill Creek shopping center! Why, you could soak up some nature here, feeling as if you were in the wild beyond, then amble over to watch a movie or get groceries. Amazing, really. And what’s even more amazing is the town hasn’t given it even a backward glance. The land around it has suffered as a consequence. Word gets out when you’ve got a beautiful waterfall in the neighborhood, within walking distance of a big parking lot. We’re spreading it
year-old dad who sprained an ankle trying to stay dry. You can also hang back at the trailhead by the bubbling creek and watch the elk bathing in a pond in the distance. This is all very lovely, but beware: If you’re lucky, the winding eightmile road down to the trailhead has been freshly graded. More likely, however, it will be mostly potholes. And it’s so narrow, you’ll suck it in when cars pass you going the other direction. — Scottie Lee Meyers The Breakdown: F ern Canyon 15.6%, Away/Back/ Home 9.8%, Patrick’s Point 6.8%, Avenue of the Giants 3.7%, Ferndale 2.8%. Category popularity: 13th.
Best Elected Official
The lamentable early retirement of last year’s champ, First District County Supervisor Jimmy Smith (get well soon, Jimmy!), left this category wide open, Mark Lovelace at the I Block Party. photo by bob doran and reader responses ran the gamut from the proudly ignorant (“none they all suck”) to the keenly argued (Harbor Commissioner Mike Wilson: “He ushered in an era of change, much needed”). There were a few outliers: Eureka Councilmembers Marian Brady and Mike right here. But the path that wobbles neighbors there get tired of this. Newman tied with the honorable Mayor down to the base of this gorgeous fall is a How about a little direction, town McCheese at one vote apiece. But in the nasty, makeshift scrape made by feet, not planners — not so much to make it end our readers showed the most love for engineers, and not only is it slippery and easy on the seekers, but to protect Third District Supervisor Mark Lovelace dangerous, but years of urban waterfall the stream bank and the privacy of the who come January will be the most senior seekers have eroded the bank. Plus, folks residents nearby? county supervisor and the lone progreslooking for this — Heidi Walters sive voice left on the board. Our readers place likely will sing his praises: just drive onto the “Professional, dediroad leading to it, cated, fair, open-minded, rather than park hard-working.” “Very at the shopping responsive to specific center and walk needs and keeps very in. There’s one open communication with teensy pullout, the people of the county. so they’ll keep He also represents us very driving until well throughout the state they’re intruding and across the nation.” upon a para— Ryan Burns dise of private property dotted by cows milling around a scooped-out pasture pond. Probably the Waterfall in McKinleyville. Photo by Heidi Walters
The Breakdown: Mark Lovelace 20.3%, (Statement of disillusionment/rage) 17.6%, Paul Gallegos 7.4%, Wes Chesbro 5.2%, Linda Atkins 5%, Rex Bohn 5%, Mike Wilson 4.7%, Shane Brinton 4.4%, Jimmy Smith 4%, Mike Thompson 3.5%.
continued on next page northcoastjournal.com • North Coast Journal • Thursday, Sept. 20, 2012
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