Santa Cruz County

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Big Trees Trestles: Spring Canyon

In the previous post I highlighted the tightest turning trestle in the United States, the Indian Creek Trestle on the Roaring Camp & Big Trees Narrow Gauge Railroad. While this is impressive, the Spring Canyon Trestles are even more impressive.

The trestles includes a lower trestle and an upper trestle. The uphill tracks passed under the upper trestle on the lower trestle, corkscrewed around and then crossing over the lower on the upper. The upper trestle railbed was 80 feet off the ground.

The two trestles were built in 1966 and the first train of passengers crossed the trestles in the same year.

50 years ago, on June 27, 1976, at approximately 6:30 PM, the trestles went up in flames. The work of ten years before was a total loss.

Locals reported hearing a loud explosion shortly before the fire started. It was suspected that the cause was arson, either from an environmentalist destroying the trestles to prevent logging (the railroad was a tourist attraction and never a logging operation) or a disgruntled employee. Neither theory has been proven and fire of 1976 is shrouded in mystery.

The ghosts of the past still remain at Roaring Camp in the charred black beams of the Spring Valley Trestles.

And I was here to see them and sketch the standing remains of the Spring Canyon Trestles.

The remains of the high or upper trestle. 50 years later and the redwood forest is slowly reclaiming the trestle.
The rusted rails leading to the lower trestle. This is where trains coming from Roaring Camp entered the trestle complex.
A young redwood stands in the middle of the railbed at the other end of the lower trestle as it passes under the upper trestle.

The Roaring Camp’s founder and owner Norman Clark wanted to rebuild the trestle but the insurance company would not allow another wooden trestle to be built, instead they preferred steel but this did not fit in with Clark’s vision for historical accuracy for a logging railroad.

My field sketch of the upper and end of the lower trestle.

Instead of rebuilding the two trestles (which would also be expensive) a fix was planned and engineered to take the railroad up and out of Spring Canyon without the trestles.

The first section of the switchback heading up the hill (left track) at the steepest grade in any narrow gauge railroad (9.5%). The train comes up the hill on the center track and after passing the switch, backs up the steep grade. On the far right the rusted track the led to the lower trestle can be seen.

A series of switchbacks was constructed in the space of just four months and these switchbacks are still in use 50 years later.

No. 1 pulls past the switch and waits for the conductor to flip the switch so the train can back up the 9.5% grade on the first leg of the switchback. This is the most work the Dixiana will encounter on the way to Bear Mountain.
No. 1 heading out of the switchbacks on her way to Bear Mountain. The engineer lays on the whistle to blow the grade crossing at the fire road.
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Big Trees Trestles: Indian Creek

The trestle that spans Indian Creek at Roaring Camp in Felton, Ca. is one of the engineering marvels at the Roaring Camp & Big Trees Narrow Gauge Railroad.

The wooden trestle rises to a height of 35 feet as it climbs a total of 50 feet as it winds around. It is the tightest turning trestle in the United States.

The tight curve of the tightest curving trestle in the United States gives you good views of the locomotive and redwoods.

To sketch the trestle I hiked up from Henry Cowell State Park and stood on a fire road that parallels the beginning of the trestle. When the railroad was being built in the early to mid 1960s efforts were made to build around the existing redwood and Douglas-fir trees instead of removing them.

Looking down from the Indian Creek Trestle makes you feel like you’re flying!
No. 1 “Dixiana” climbs up the curve of the Indian Creek Trestle.
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Big Trees & Pacific

I remember the excitement of the up and coming passenger service returning to the former Southern Pacific branch line from Santa Cruz to Felton.

The time was the mid-80s but my dad remembered the days when stream locomotives labored up the grade above our cabin. The drivers would slip on the wet morning rails (every foamer loves a bit of wheel slip) and they would back down the grade, sanding the rails as they went to have another go.

It was Norman Clark’s dream to one day purchase the line and operate a passenger train on the standard gauge rails to Santa Cruz. Clark was the founder of the narrow gauge railroad at Roaring Camp.

Unfortunately Clark died before seeing his dream come to fruition.

My dad was certainly excited to see this rail dream come true. It would be exciting to again hear the sounds of trains crossing the trestle at Shady Gulch, just up hill from my cabin and hearing the engineer blow the grade crossing on Highway 9.

I remember visiting the yard in Felton with my dad and looking at the Big Trees & Pacific’s first locomotive, a 45 ton Whitcomb diesel. My dad was always taking pictures.

We rode the train during the first few years of its existence. It only went as far as the old Santa Cruz Depot. The train now stops outside the Boardwalk.

It was a long time ago when you could travel from Santa Cruz over the mountains to San Francisco by train.

Since the first run, the railroad has purchased two former Atchison, Topeka, & Santa Fe EMD CF-7s and rolling stock from back east. For the first part of the loco’s service they bore the livery of the blue and gold of Santa Fe. They are now painted redwood red.

The crew prepares the EMD CF7 2600 for her eight mile run to Santa Cruz. Gotta keep the windows clean.
Locomotive 2600 starting out from Felton on its way to Santa Cruz. The train runs along the boundary of Henry Cowell State Park.

What is unusual on a tourist railroad is the amount of street running the railroad covers in Santa Cruz. Street running is where the trains runs on the same right of way as cars. The trains runs along Chestnut Street and Beach Street.

2600 with a nine car consist running along Chestnut Street. Note the blue car on the far right yielding to the train, good idea!
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Shay Locomotive: Dixiana

To really understand something, more than just taking a photograph in a fraction of a second, you should take the time to draw the object you hope to understand.

I wanted to understand the design and engineering of a Shay geared locomotive. I knew that at the end of the drawing, I would know a Shay so much better. My subject was the Westside Lumber Company three truck Shay No. 15 (this is a sister to the new Roaring Camp No. 14).

I was copying a picture from one of my favorite books when I was a kid: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of North American Locomotives by Brian Hollingsworth.

This was not a sketch but a drawing and it was very much more involved, meaning I was taking lots of measurements and applying them to my sketchbook, focusing on proportions and details. The drawing was done over a series of evenings. This was the opposite of a loose continuous-line sketch. I liked the process but it was taxing. I was wearing the hat of a draftsman not a sketcher.

My finished drawing.

After drawing a Shay in great detail, I wanted to sketch a real live Shay under steam, in a continuous-line way.

That’s easily done from my Santa Cruz digs by driving 15 minutes up Highway 9 to Roaring Camp & Big Trees Railroads.

I originally wanted to sketch the Shay and Heisler lined up next to each other at the engine shed. At the front gate I learned the difference of asking for permission and asking for forgiveness.

Now it was time for Plan B: sketching the Dixiana at the depot. I had sketched the locomotive from the same perspective before, but this time I wanted to render the scene in a continuous-line sketch. I knew that I would only have about 10 minutes to sketch the scene before the train departed for Bear Mountain.

The builder’s plate on No. 1’s boiler.

Before the train arrived, I sketched the old rusted wagon top boiler on display in the grounds. It was built by Lima in 1912 and used on the No. 1 until it was retired in 1976.

No. 1 passing by on its way to the depot. Here you can see why a Shay is called a geared locomotive.

The two truck Shay backed into the depot from the engine house with her six car consist. Now it was time to sketch. The looser the better (featured sketch).

No. 1 Dixiana pulls out from the depot on the way up to Bear Mountain.
A sketch of Dixiana on the first page of my new panoramic journal with the real deal in the background.

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Roaring Camp’s New No. 14

From my redwood cabin deck I love to hear the steam whistle from the No. 1 Shay “Dixiana” echoing down the San Lorenzo Valley from Roaring Camp and Big Trees Narrow Gauge Railroad in Felton.

I will be hearing a new whistle coming down the valley in the near (or not so near) future.

On August 9, 2026, Westside Lumber Co. No. 14 was delivered to Felton.

No. 14 is a three tuck Shay built by the Lima Locomotive Works in Lima, Ohio in 1916. Shays are geared locomotives designed to tackle steep grades (up to 9%) on lumber railroads. What they lack in speed they have in power and torque in spades. Between 1880 and 1944, Lima built 2,770 Shays.

No. 14 was originally built for the Sierra Nevada Wood & Lumber Company. In 1937 the company went bankrupt and the Shay made its way to the Westside Lumber Company in 1939. The locomotive was in service there until the mill shut down in 1961.

No. 14 moved around to other museums and railroads before finally making her way to Roaring Camp.

No. 14’s builder’s plate.

On Saturday morning I headed up to Felton to see the 110 year old new kid on the block.

Roaring Camp and Big Trees was founded by Norman Clark in 1962 as a narrow gauge (36 inches) steam tourist railroad.

The railroad has such a historic collection of geared steam logging locomotives that the American Society of Mechanical Engineers designated three of the railroad’s locomotives as Historic Mechanical Landmark #134 in 1988.

The historic landmark marker on the depot.
Two of Roaring Camp’s Mechanical Landmarks: Shay No. 1 “Dixiana” and Heisler No. 2 “Tuolumne” steamed up and getting ready for the day at the locomotive shed.

I walked around the shops and No. 14 was on a track leading into the locomotive shed. I pulled out my sketchbook and started a continuous-line sketch of the newly acquired three truck Shay (featured sketch).

On the right is the No. 2 Heisler under steam waiting to pull out and connect with her five car consist. On the left, No. 14 can be seen through the shed. The locomotive had arrived just six days before.
The star of the show and the real workhorse of the railroad. The first Shay of Roaring Camp, No. 1 “Dixiana” coupled with her six car consist.
The two railroads in one shot. In the foreground is the steam narrow gauge railroad and in the background is the standard gauge Big Trees & Pacific which runs down to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, as well as passing right above my cabin.
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River Muses: Vivid Dancer

On a riverside rock I noticed a black and blue damselfly. I later found out it was a vivid dancer (what a name). The dancer perched horizontally on the rock with wings held parallel to it abdomen, dragonflies hold their wings at a 90 degree angle from their body.

If I thought sparrows (little brown jobs), gulls, and peeps (shorebirds) were hard to identify then putting a species name or even a genus to a dragon or damselfly is supremely daunting!

It felt good to be a novice again.

I started a spread anchored in the bottom left corner by a sketch of the river rocks and the damselfly perched on one of them. The black and blue wonder spent a lot of its time sallying forth and chasing away other damselflies (I assume it was of the same species) like a hummingbird guarding its patch of flowers.

A bit of blue amongst the green.

I traced out the damselfly’s path and its return to the same rock perch.

Through sketching, I learn and on the top of the spread I drew the anatomy of a damselfly.

The eyes of the damselfly are massive in proportion to its body. These aerial hunters have excellent eyesight.

Now if I could only identify the large black and yellow dragonfly cruising above my head. I’m hoping it’s the western river cruiser (Macromia magnifica).

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River Muses: Fluid Poem

Lazy afternoons in August found me sitting in my Crazy Creek chair, feet in the San Lorenzo, sucking on some suds, and reading John D. McDonald’s Cape Fear.

I love being surrounded by nature. It is really a sensory sweater with the sound of the river over rocks just upstream and the rattle of the belted kingfisher. Splashes of color fill my view, the flash of the said kingfisher passing by, inches off the water and the vibrant dragonflies and butterflies patrolling the shore.

And there is a feel of the cool river water running over my feet and the sweeping brush of the crawdad’s antennas followed by an exploratory pinch.

Crayfish investigating my foot. (I’m not dead yet!)

Watching the reflection from f the river play across the far bank inspired me to poetry. I included the poem on the left hand side of the spread.

The Mystery Spot

Sketching and researching the history of local roadside attractions of the past such as Lost World and Santa’s Village, made me want to sketch a historic tourist attraction that is still alive and well.

If you’ve never been to the Mystery Spot it highly likely that you have seen the bright yellow bumper stickers on cars in the Golden State.

This car’s owner either really loves the Mystery Spot, uses bumper stickers to hold the car together, or is an employee shamelessly promoting their employer; probably all three.

While my family visited the Boardwalk and even Lost World and Santa’s Village, we didn’t make our way up Branciforte into the redwoods. Perhaps the Mystery Spot was just too strange.

I first visited the quirky attraction as an adult and am still trying to decide if it was really worth the time and expense. It some sense it reminded me of the title of a Shakespearean comedy.

You know you are near with billboards leading the way. I love the funky banana slug which I added to my sketch.

The Mystery Spot was first discovered in 1939 by George Prather and was opened to the public a year later. Since the attraction has garnered enough visitors to keep it open for over 85 years, 365 days a year. But what exactly is the Mystery Spot?

The main attraction to this roadside attraction is that it is a “gravity hill” (the first in California), meaning that the area appears to defy gravity.

In 1941 Prather built a “crazy house” where guides now lead tours to highlight the Mystery Spot’s bewildering effects.

Is this real or just a visual illusion? Spoiler alert: the house is slanted at a 20 degree angle.

The Mystery Spot was designated a California Historical Landmark (# 1055) in August of 2014.

An old billboard, which I assume was located 1 1/2 miles from the Spot. Most contemporary visitors would not know what Life, “You Asked For It”, or even a magazine are!

I arrived on a Saturday afternoon and the parking lot was almost full, proving that this is still a very popular attraction. Now I needed to avoid the crowds and find a good sketching angle.

I took the hiking trail which gave me some elevation and a nice perspective to sketch the entrance (featured sketch).

Lost Trees of Scotts Valley

The Santa Cruz County town of Scotts Valley is bisected by Highway 17. The highway sees a lot traffic as travelers from the Bay Area head to the seaside town of Santa Cruz.

The Santa Cruz area already has it’s attractions, the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk and the Mystery Spot being some of the most visited. Scotts Valley needed to capture some of those tourist dollars.

Two attractions were build on either side of the highway. Both attractions are now gone and there is little evidence that they ever existed. But I was going to sketch the only trees left in Scotts Valley that were part of the attraction called The Tree Circus.

The genesis of the Tree Circus was a Swedish-American named Axel Erlandson. In the early 1900s Erlandson’s family moved from Minnesota to California’s Central Valley.

While there, Erlandson began grafting and shaping trees in various shapes. He primarily used sycamores and box elder for his arboreal sculptures.

A plaque featuring some of Erlandson’s trees.

Erlandson was looking for a location for his wooden oddities and he opened The Tree Circus in 1947 in Scotts Valley on the western side of Highway 17. The advertising slogan he used was, “See the World’s Strangest Trees Here.” At the time admission was just 25-cents. The attraction was featured many times in Ripley’s “Believe it or Not!” and other publications such as Life magazine.

Some murals shows Scotts Valley’s roadside attractions of the past.

In 1940, Highway 17 opened, bypassing the old stage road, Scotts Valley Drive, where the Tree Circus was located.

In 1963 Erlandson sold the property to Larry and Peggy Thompson. Erlandson died a year later.

Erlandson’s final resting place at Oakwood Cemetery in Santa Cruz.

The Thompsons added 30 fiberglass dinosaurs, created a stream through the property, and renamed the grove of Erlandson’s tree “The Enchanted Forest”.

The new attraction was named “Lost World”. I remember visiting the park as a kid during this time. From Highway 17 you could see the large T. Rex and triceratops.

The attendance slowed and Lost World was eventually closed and sold in 1977.

The trees were saved and bought by Michael Bonfante, owner of a local supermarket chain, who replanted them in his new amusement park in Gilroy called Bonfante Gardens (now called Gilroy Gardens).

On Saturday I arrived at the Tree Circus Center, sounds like a perfect place to find remnants of Erlandson’s art. The only business open at this hour was a hair salon.

I did know I owned a sporting goods store in Scotts Valley!

Before me was two sycamores leaning towards each other in an unnatural way. This is all that remains in Scotts Valley of the Erlandson’s Tree Circus.

Two lone sycamores.

Evidence of Santa’s Village is even harder to find. There is nothing left of the former Christmas themed amusement park (yes it was open all year long), which I also attended as a child.

It open in 1957 and remained in business until 1979. There is now a row of houses on the property. But the exit from Highway 17 homeowners take to get to their houses is telling;

The Bigfoot Discovery Museum

In 2026, the Bigfoot Discovery Museum in Felton, California is about as hard to find as the Sasquatch itself.

I always love curious roadside attractions and it seems when you combine a highway (Highway 9) with coast redwoods, you are bound to find a Bigfoot museum.

The museum was founded by Stanford grad Michael Rugg in 2004. At the age of four, Rugg saw Bigfoot and claimed to have locked eyes with the mysterious being. He later worked in Silicon Valley during the dot com boom and the eventual bust. After the bust he opened the museum.

A friend and I visited the museum, just up the highway from my cabin, about 15 years ago.

The museum contains a curious mix of artifacts including plaster foot casts, Harry and the Hendersons memorabilia, a picture of Chewbacca, supposed Bigfoot scat, and a section about the famous Patterson-Gimlin film.

The famous frame 352 of the Patterson-Gimlin Film. Should the fact the it was filmed at Bluff Creek be an inside joke? The jury is still out if this is indeed a hoax.

My friend thought the museum was creepy and we didn’t stay long. In truth you could see the entire small museum in less than 15 minutes.

This museum is very reminiscent of many private museums on highways; they are a mixture of hard science (cryptozoology), cheesy gift shop, and the really ridiculous.

The cheesy, ridiculous side seems to undermine the main purpose of the museum: proving the existence of Bigfoot.

In 2025, there was a fire in a cabin behind the museum but the museum and its collection was spared. Maybe the blaze was set by Sasquatch, to destroy evidence of his existence.

After 20 years in business in the San Lorenzo Valley (not really known as a hotspot for Bigfoot sightings) the museum closed with Rugg’s retirement.

An odd carved bear has replaced the wooden Bigfoot carvings. The statues were definitely cheesy including an adult with a young one on its shoulders.

By the time I sketched the former museum, the only evidence left that this was a building dedicated to the search for hidden life was the mural painted on the side of the red barn.

I would firmly put this mural in the cheesy, ridiculous column.