blue lotus adventures

The Redwood Creek is a beautiful, shallow river. It is rocky and popular with area fishermen. Technically it is not a trail however the park service has put signage on the Emerald Ridge Trail and they also tell you this are the visitor center that this loop exists. The park service map even shows an unmaintained trail along the river bank. This is misleading because the to complete the loop, you must cross Redwood Creek more than I few times. I did this in mid June and I had to cross this 6 times.

When you enter the river bed, you walk along the river on dry portions of the gravel river bank. Eventually you run out of real estate and have to cross the river to get to the next dry gravel bench. You will get wet! Several of the crossings the water was up to my knees. Keep this in mind because your hiking boots will need several days to dry out. There are too many crossings to waste time taking off and putting on the your boots.

Be sure to check with the park rangers before taking on this hike. This hike should only be done in late spring and summer. I also recommend hiking the loop in a clockwise direction, entering from Emerald Ridge Trail. Once on the river bank you will travel down stream (turn right) and hike for 1.7 miles. Here is the difficult part. Where to exit the river. This was hard to determine. A map is essentials! There is a small stream entering the river from the left called Tom McDonald Creek. Just after this stream there is a large gravel shore area. Walk toward the tree line and look for some small orange ribbons tied to tree branches. These were faded when I was here and it took about 10 minutes to find the right place. This exits you onto the Tall Trees Loop Trail. This was one of the best trails I did this trip. I was wet, uncomfortable but the scenery was amazing and I loved every minute of it!