Relaxing at the Russian River

North of San Francisco is the idyllic Russian River.

Here I caught up with some old friends from my days at Duke University. Everyone made a journey from afar - New York, Wisconsin, Colorado, Oregon and even Vancouver.

Our first outing was at the nearby Armstrong Redwoods State Natural Reserve. Some of the trees are over one thousand years old. The one we are pictured with is 1400 years old!

It was a botanical dream come true to walk in the redwoods (Sequoia sempervirens). Redwoods are only found in California, and are among the tallest known living trees. But there are fossils of redwoods known that indicate that their range was much bigger in the past.

Our cabin was among the redwoods and in the evening we went for walks among them. In the photo below you can see how big the trunks are - Alex and Matias are there for scale.

And the redwoods are even in the middle of the road!

We also visited the foggy California coast.

It was too cold to swim so we left that to the seals.

But Russian River itself was perfect for swimming. It was a delight to swim surrounded by the magnificent redwoods.