Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park

Del Norte Coast Redwoods may not get the same reverent nods as its superstar neighbors, Prairie Creek to the south and Jedediah Smith to the north, but it still packs a punch: towering old-growth redwoods, a steep descent to a hidden cove, and one of the more entertaining trail names in the system. Damnation Creek, Damnation Cove, Damnation Trail-you get the idea.

As the story goes, early settlers cursed their way through this thick forest, hacking toward the creek and giving it a name that stuck. Even legendary explorer Jedediah Smith, no stranger to hard country, camped here in 1828 and reportedly had a devil of a time. The name still feels apt, especially if you’ve just hiked back up from the cove on a warm day.

But before we damn the place too much, let’s give credit where it’s due: this is a gorgeous slice of redwood coast. The first mile alone delivers cathedral trees, rhododendrons that bloom 30 feet high, and ferns so lush they look borrowed from a tropical jungle. Add Sitka spruce on the lower slopes, salt air drifting in from the Pacific, and the distant bellow of a foghorn, and you’ve got a walk that awakens all the senses.

One of the hike’s charms is that it briefly joins the “new” Coastal Trail, which in this section is the old Highway 101. There’s something deeply satisfying about walking a stretch of asphalt that once carried cars and trucks, now reclaimed by hikers, elk, and the sound of the surf. For a Trailmaster, there’s no greater joy than seeing a highway returned to nature and put to its highest purpose: a footpath.

The payoff at trail’s end is Damnation Cove itself, a rocky pocket where the creek meets the sea, framed by sea stacks and backed by towering cliffs. At low tide you can scramble along the shore. At high tide, better to sit back, stay dry, and let the surf roar do the talking.