Backroad Odyssey : Travel Stories, Van Life & Road Trip Oddities
Traveling America's backroads, road trip experts - Noah and Noodles - explore fascinating locations overlooked while traveling.
Living out of a van, they unravel the - often shocking - story behind each neglected story or location.
If you love travel, exploration and unique locations - join us on the road!
Backroad Odyssey : Travel Stories, Van Life & Road Trip Oddities
Van Life Diaries - The Lost Coast: California's Last Wilderness
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A singular stretch of untamed wilderness lines Calirfonia's Northern Coast.
A landscape so rugged and dramatic that the state's infamous 'route one' avoids it's sheer cliffs and crashing waves.
My dog Noodles and I spend three days along this coast - while there we hear a love story.
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We answer listener questions at the end, which include:
- How do you know where you're going next?
- Does your van get messy?
- Was there anything that surprised you in researching Plymouth Rock?
- What cryptid are you most scared of?
Recommendations:
Black Sands Beach near Shelter Cove:
https://sheltercovecalifornia.com/the-lost-coast-trail
Beer and Food:
Backpacking for the brave - make sure you reserve in advance:
https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/california/lost-coast-trail-mattole-to-black-sands-beach
Works Cited:
https://www.savetheredwoods.org/project/lost-coast-redwoods/
https://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=28172
https://www.aspireadventurerunning.com/the-lost-coast-the-ancestral-lands-of-the-sinkyone-people/
https://sheltercovecalifornia.com/the-lost-coast-trail
https://michaelbass.media/THE-LOST-COAST
https://www.visitredwoods.com/listing/shelter-cove-on-the-lost-coast/138/
https://www.visitcalifornia.com/experience/lost-coast/
Noah and Noodles here!
We want to extend a heartfelt thanks to every listener of Backroad Odyssey.
Your support fuels our passion and inspires us to keep sharing stories and discover overlooked locations.
Follow each adventure visually at:
https://www.instagram.com/backroadsodyssey/
Cruisin' to the Lost Coast
Speaker 1Cruisin' down the street . I wonder where this road would lead . So many possibilities . Care to share what you think . Oh , noodle Dolls , what do you see ? Back Road Odyssey .
Speaker 1This coast is wild , unpredictable , untouched . Here , crashing waves greet scaling mountains , redwood giants touch the sky . This is one of California's last remaining wildernesses . This is one of California's last remaining wildernesses . This right here is the Lost Coast . Welcome to Van Life Diaries . I'm your host , noah , joined as always by my dog and co-host , noodles the Woodle . If you've been with the show , welcome back . Always good to have you . If you're new here , welcome . Thanks for traveling with us Today in classic Van Life Diary fashion .
Speaker 1The show will be relatively unscripted , but interesting Nonetheless , I assure you , because today we dive deep into California's last remaining coastal wilderness . Dive deep into California's last remaining coastal wilderness , the Lost Coast , a landscape so rugged , so dramatic that California's mighty Route 1 was forced to diverge eastward . We'll also answer listener questions at the end , as is tradition in every Van Life Diaries , but for now , noodles and I drive the winding roads . We follow the smell of the Pacific to our destination today Shelter Cove , which lies at the southernmost point of the Lost Coast in Northern California . In the three days we spend there , we hike along the sea , research the area's history and hear an unexpected love story that I've yet to forget and don't think I ever will . Waves , like words , trickle A stream along the mountain to the sea , pooling there . A field of flowers flow , flowing you into me , alright . So this is easily one of the windiest , one of the most unpredictable roads I've ever driven , but then it wouldn't be where we're going to if it was not
California's Last Coastal Wilderness
Speaker 1. We , of course , are talking about the Lost Coast . Noodles and I will base ourselves for the next three days in Shelter Cove . It's a small town of something like 700 people at the southernmost point of the Lost Coast .
Speaker 1Where else do we start with this rugged , often not known piece of land in Northern California ? But the beginning ? For thousands of years , the Sinkion people culled the rugged coastlands extending from the ocean to the south fork of the Eel River . Home Located some 200 miles north of modern San Francisco . The land's continued health remained a priority for the Sinkion people . They would rotationally burn coastal prairies and woodlands , leave the larger redwoods be generally and sustainably hunt and forage both in the rough sea below and within their forested mountains above . But they weren't entirely unique In those days , the length of the California coast was unspoiled , unaltered . So there were many with this mindset . But when gold is discovered in California , this long stretch of California wilderness begins to wither , valley by valley , shore by shore , inching its way north .
Speaker 1We've been here for two days so far . I've never experienced simultaneously such solitude and felt like so much is going on . A lot's happened . Noodles ate a crab , barked at sea lions . We
History of the Sinkion People
Speaker 1went for a few hikes , walked the nearby black sand beach . I'd love to talk at length about any one of those , but I had a conversation yesterday that I feel I have to share .
Speaker 1So Noodles and I were walking , it was slightly foggy , wet , and a local comes up to us and starts to talk . I reckon she doesn't see many
When Gold Changed Everything
Speaker 1visitors here , but we talk and I tell her why I'm here , I ask her about herself and she goes on to tell this story , the story about how her and her husband of some 50 years ended up here in this cut-off town of something like 700 . She says this you know , I've always loved the mountains . I grew up in Colorado . They always make me feel at home . I knew eventually I'd like to end up by some mountains and my husband always preferred , always loved the sea and he wanted to end up by the sea . That's where he felt he had to be . Then she takes a pause and she looks at me and says when it came to retire we tried to look for both . And here we are in Shelter Cove . I have my mountains , he has his sea . It was work , but we're happy
A Love Story in Shelter Cove
Speaker 1here . She then said goodbye , leaving Noodles and I to watch her as she faded into the fog in her light blue coat . Called by her song , we followed . We came . A cove by any other name would a shelter remain ? The glint of gold always writes a story we're all too familiar with .
Speaker 1At this point , the Sinkiana pushed off their land violently and fatally in many cases , as commercial logging ensues in the name of progress . By 1965 , percent of the once two million acres of old-growth Californian redwoods remain Somehow someway . The lost coast remains relatively unaltered to the north . From 1850 , when Shelter Cove was founded onwards , the land in Northern California , originally inhabited by the Cinquean , changes hands frequently . As the land passes from company to company , from person to person , a consensus is reached this land is too remote , too rugged to be practical or profitable . Simultaneously , by 1975 , a latent environmental movement opposing logging operations moving towards the coast begins to surface . 1975 sees the creation of Sineon Wilderness State Park , just south of Modern Shelter Cove . A series of lawsuits and conservation land grabs around the area later ensue , and conservation land grabs around the area later in soon , with the help , among others , of Save , the Redwoods League and the intertribal Cinquean Wilderness Council . So at this time conservation is winning .
Speaker 1But the final nail in the establishment of California's lost coast isn't either of those things . It comes with the completion of California's Route 1 in 1937 . It's simply too hard , too expensive to continue the highway at that point . And it's at this point in the 30s , when the now inaccessible , economically inactive land is depopulated . Everybody leaves . This is one of California's last remaining wildernesses . This right here is the Lost Coast .
Speaker 1All right , I'm sitting here , a mountain behind me , the Pacific in front , seals barking in the distance , tempting noodles to do the same . Any direction you look is scenic . It's virtually unaltered , uninhabited .
How the Lost Coast Stayed Wild
Speaker 1I've been here three days now and I've finally got some thoughts . Three days now and I've finally got I've got some thoughts .
Speaker 1Um so when I first got here I thought , looking around at this pristine landscape , that shelter cove didn't really fit in . It felt out of place in this vast wilderness here . But then I remembered how hard it was to get here with the van , but also just generally it's hard to get here With the van , but also just generally it's hard to get here the winding roads , the long drives . And I was left with one unavoidable fact really Anyone who is here has to want to come here . They have to want to be here . No one has ever , nor will they ever , stumble upon Shelter Cove or stumble upon the Lost Coast . It's impossible . You have to want to come here . You have to go out of your way to view the mountains you love , go out of your way to see the sea every morning and this , for my new local friend and her husband , is undeniably true . It's what they did . It would in so many ways be easier for both of them to live somewhere else , but to experience this unparalleled blending of mountains , a forest of sea without developments , a forest of sea without developments , without crowds , that's a price that to some people , is worth paying . Yet this one is yours and this one is mine , both of them ours . How could we not stay and sit and spend and feel our final hours ? This coast is wild , unpredictable , untouched .
Finding Beauty through Deliberate Choice
Speaker 1Here , crashing waves greet scaling mountains , redwood giants touch the sky . This is one of California's last remaining wildernesses . To get here to appreciate it , you've got to treat it as such .
Speaker 1I have some final thoughts and a story at the end , but for now let's get to listener questions . How do you decide where you're going next ? Great question , thank you . It always starts with weather . It really always does . If it's going to be sunny for my solar , if it's going to be cold , hot , I want me and Noodles to be comfortable in the van . I don't want to encounter storms or anything like that . So it starts with weather . But then I think about what I'd find interesting and what I think you'd find interesting as well . I want to kind of tell stories , share locations that people overlook , and I look for those that people overlook and I look for those . I use an app called Road Trippers , among other things , to find these locations , these stories , and I go from there . But it always starts with the weather .
Speaker 1Does your van get messy ? For sure it does . It's my studio , it's my home , my kitchen , everything . And with such a small space , the moment you put anything anywhere , it becomes messy . I try to clean it . Every time I go to a spot , a location , I clean it up , I organize , but it's hard . You know it's a small space and yeah , yeah , any video you see of these van life people , rv people , who have pristine looking places is not the reality of it , unless you know they're much better and more cleanly and on top of it than I am , which could be the case , I don't know , but yeah , it gets messy for sure .
Speaker 1Was there anything that surprised you in researching the story of Plymouth Rock ? I don't know , but yeah , it gets messy for sure . Was there anything that surprised you
Listener Questions Answered
Speaker 1in researching the story of Plymouth Rock ? I mean , first of all , I didn't expect it to be a true story . I've heard throughout my life that the rock is more symbolic than anything , so I don't know if anything surprised me that much . But what interested me a lot and maybe surprised me a little bit , is the fact that the Anglican church , specifically , is an extension of the monarchy and vice versa , and consequently was used as a form of political control to keep everybody in line with . You know , morally , but also politically , what was going on within England people to try to get out of England . Because of that , I'd say , that interested me a lot and the extent of that , I guess , did surprise me . So , yeah , more than anything , that surprised me the most , that would not have been a fun time to live , that's for sure .
Speaker 1What cryptid are you most scared of ? We've been doing a lot of cryptid episodes . I had this idea , and reach out to me if you have any recommendations backroadodysseypod at gmailcom . I had this idea of doing a series on every cryptid for every state . So if you have any recs , reach out to me . But going back to what you asked , so , what cryptid am I most scared of ? Probably like the psychedelic cryptids you know , like Mothman , who aren't necessarily like physically going to come and get you . Yeah , so I don't know if I could say a specific one , but anything that's you know , got mind powers or anything like that . Again , hey , reach out to me . Backroadodysseypod at gmailcom . Would love to hear from you . Would love to do an episode dot com . We'd love to hear from you . We'd love to do an episode . It's Noah here . Thanks for traveling with us today .
Speaker 1First I'd like to say this California has something like 40 million people . I'd been through all the major cities . I'd been kind of peopled out and it's a good feeling when I was able to venture to the lost coast , to be in a landscape that seems impenetrable , untouched Nature is in charge there right and that felt fantastic , especially after being in the southern part of California , which I enjoyed tremendously too , but to feel that solitude was really special . I have some recommendations
Final Thoughts and Recommendations
Speaker 1. So there's a beautiful black sand rock , sand slash rock beach that's nearby Shelter Cove . Jippo Ale Mill has good food and beer in Shelter Cove , and the Lost Coast Trail is a three , four day hike that I would have loved to do but couldn't at the time . It either starts or ends at Shelter Cove , just east of Shelter Cove , depending on your preference , so check that out .
Speaker 1I will add links in the show notes to each one of those . It was at the Black Sand Beach , actually with noodles , and that's where she ate a live crab . So that was . That's not really a story , but that did happen . I'd also like to thank the author of the poem read throughout the episode today , christian Collado , a Chicago author , voice actor and a good friend . So thank you to Christian and , if you find value in the show , if you'd like to see us continue to improve rating and subscribing is the best way that you can help Noodles and I do that , so I really appreciate every second you spend listening , and if you rate or subscribe , that's great as well . Thanks for joining us in the van just for a little bit . Be good to each other . Where to next ?
