Trip to Ferndale and Eureka

December, 2014

The first house we saw in Ferndale

I heard about the tiny Victorian town, Ferndale, while I was watching a TV show. I’m the person who always loves Victorian style , except the fashion. When I heard for the first time about the town, I asked my husband to make a trip there. This Christmas Holidays, we were thinking to going somewhere. My husband was thinking about Santa Barbara. Then I told him about Ferndale. He also likes Victorian architecture, so he agreed with me to go there. We decide to spend last few days of December away from the city, to an old town with a touch of rural flavor. 

The town was situated at the Northern part of California. After driving on the winding mountain road through the dense forest of conical shaped high redwood trees, when we reached Fortuna  it was almost 4 o’clock. The redwood forest was so beaconing that I was desperately longing hiking on the mountain trail on the chilly afternoon. Specially when I could see the cyclists and the bikers were going. The trees were so tall and so green and undamaged, it looked like that still civilized man’s hand yet to touch the forest. However, it reality it was the opposite. 

Anyway, it was a winter evening. Though it was only 4 o’clock, but seemed that it was almost going to be night. Anyway, after reaching the hotel we decided to just give a visit to the town Ferndale. 
Ferndale was very, very small town. It was very quiet, and very small. The residents were very relaxed, and not so keenly interested in the modern complicated high-tech life. I felt that, it was an ideal place to spend the retired life. As soon as we entered the town, first my eyes caught, one small victorian house with a beautiful sprawling front yard. My husband asked me to take a picture of that house. As soon as I clicked, one lady came out from the house and gave us a beautiful smile. However, we thought she was coming to object us, so we hurriedly drove away from there. Then we stopped our car near the downtown, where actually all the houses were built in Victorian style. I have no idea whether those houses were once residence or not, but currently they were all used for commercial purpose. I always love the detailing of the Victorian architecture. 

Downtown

 Victorian architecture is a series of architectural styles in the mid-to-late 19th century during the Victorian era. The houses were very brightly colored. These style is very much romantic style, very intricate and very beautiful.  Every where  from the roof to the window pane, some kind  of very detailed and ornamental design could be seen. We parked our car on the side of the road , and decided to take a walk through the  downtown to see all the houses individually. The buildings on the both side of the road were very old yet they were very well maintained. Even the post office was also beautifully designed. We went there just after Christmas. 

So, all the Christmas trees were still there. All the shops kept their Christmas tree outside of the shop. I am mentioning it here, because all the trees were decorated with the crafts made by the local children. After the small downtown, everywhere were only the ranches and fields. The cows were grazing there. 
We came back to the hotel, and decided to find out more places there to visit. Thankfully the hotel provided a book with many information about neighborhood area. We found out that next town, Eureka had more Victorian building than Ferndale. My foodie husband wanted a different restaurant to dine out. He found out Samoa cookhouse. 
Next morning we weren’t in hurry. We knew that it was not  going to much time to see all the Victorian buildings, as there was no option to go inside of individual house to see the interiors. So, we started around 10:00 in the morning, after a hearty breakfast at Best Western Inn, where we were lodging. We directly went to the Carson house in Eureka. 

Carson house

It was famous landmark there. The mansion was built for William Carson, who came to join the gold rush in California, later formed a lumber company. The mansion was a mix of every major style of Victorian Architecture, especially Queen Anne style. However, later, the mansion was  converted to a private club, called Ingomer Club. The house opposite to Carson mansion, attracted me a lot. The pink house may be not that much ravishing compared to the mansion, but it had its own charm. The ornamental architecture was not so detailed, but it was very homely. I tried to find out something about the house, but sadly I couldn’t find out anything. From there we went to the solitaire seaside. We walked along on the deck, sometimes we stopped and watched the yachts stood in rows.

 We started walking along the narrow lanes of the historic old downtown, where all the buildings are Victorian style. Most of them were either motels or shops. I don’t know whether they were residences before. In Eureka old town and in Ferndale, I didn’t find any retail chain. All kind of shops were boutiques. Though I didn’t go inside, but from outside all the shops were looking stunning. Every shop was decorated in Victorian style. I felt that we went back to old time through a time machine. 

The beautiful pink house just opposite to Carson house

My husband wanted to go to Samoa cookhouse to have lunch. From Eureka, we headed to Samoa cookhouse, crossing a long bridge. The Samoa Peninsula was the land barrier that separates northern Humboldt Bay from the Pacific Ocean. Samoa is a peninsula between Eureka and Arcata. Samoa was punched by a private company which wanted make it a beach destination. However,it was ended up as a working town with sawmill factories. 

Eureka downtown

The reason is unknown to me.  When the land took shape as a working towns with sawmills factory, the Samoa Cookhouse  was opened as a humble encampments for the workers. 

Samoa Cookhouse

However, the sawmill didn’t run anymore. We saw the area was very quiet, and I felt like it motionless. After spending some time on the deserted beach we went to Samoa Cookhouse, but the eatery was almost empty, though it was opened. We were skeptical, whether the food would be good or not. So, we came back to Eureka. When we decided to go to New York Pizza, at that moment it started raining. We had no umbrella, actually I forgot about the winter rain in California. We waited in our car for some time, then practically we ran towards restaurant. We ate enormous sized sliced-pizza. Then again we strolled around the old town, and we came back to the hotel, just to spend a leisurely evening.