Travels Around Northern California

Gasquet may have the most rain in this State...but who cares.

Gasquet (pronounced GAS-kee) or in the language of the Native Tolowa, Mvs-ye, is about as far North in California as you can get without calling it Oregon.

Horace Gasquet was the owner of the gold mines, hotel, railway, bank, and post office; he was also the founder of Crescent City. As you may assume by his name, he was born in France.

The population sits at around 600 or so.

Pioneer Mary Adams Peacock(1861-1942) carried the US Mail between Crescent City to Grants Pass in the 1880’s-90’s and had a bridge named after her in 1932. She had a bridge named for her in 1932, the first for a woman in this state, and also has 2 plants named after her. Anemone adamsiana (considered a variety of Anemone oregana) and Valeriana adamsiana.

This is the home of the Tolowa people or Taa-laa-wa Dee-ni and they still reside here and are the caretakers of the land and the Smith River.

They called themselves in a political sense also Dee-ni’ , Dee-ne, Dvn-’ee, Dee-te which means "(is a) citizen of a yvtlh-’i~ (polity)" or "a person belonging to a place or village".

In 1828 the American Jedediah Smith and his exploration party were the first known non-natives to contact the Tolowa.

We all know how things went after that.

Jedediah Smith was the first American to travel from East to West Coast and the park that bears his name here is remarkably ancient and stunning.

Protect the forests. They are sacred.

We have met some human beings on our travels here. Freya met Carlena from Carlotta who has lived out here for 40 odd years. Funny enough, Carlotta is where Freya lives and my daughter is going to send a picture of the house Carlena grew up in years ago once she gets back home.

Today while waiting for our white water rafting trip with Justin, I sat next to a dude outside the Hiouchi General Store. He had warm eyes and heavily braided hair and we started talking. Turns out he was a former pro football player named Erik Affholter. “You can still find me on the internet, I can’t get away from it.”

He also made this controversial catch (video below) when he played with USC in 1987 that beat UCLA and sent them to the Rose Bowl.

We walked up the embankment after being unscathed from the white water and were greeted by Reid and Hunter who were on the road to Oregon. They were like a visit from my past. It made me smile even more.

You can escape just about everything up here.

You can hear yourself.

You can just be.

And that’s all you need to be.