Driving home from Santa Rosa Thursday, I answered what can only be described as the “call of the wild” and turned off Hwy. 12 at Glen Ellen and drove up to Jack London State Park. The last time I visited there was 1969 and I think I read “The Call of the Wild” when I was in junior high school, long before then. After exploring the museum that is housed in the huge rock home that Jack’s widow built after his death, and saw the many artifacts and books from Jack’s adventurous life, I walked a half mile through the woods to “Wolf House.” Wolf House was destroyed by fire in 1911 before Jack and his wife could move in and he died before they could rebuild it but the ruins have been preserved for more than a century.
I loved walking through the woods that are filled with oaks and redwoods. I was careful to avoid the poison oak that was everywhere along the trail (leaves of three, let it be). I’ve only had poison oak once in my life and that was one time too many for me. After my ridiculous bout with hives while I was in Oregon last week, I didn’t want to complicate my life with an outbreak of poison oak. And, despite my concern over the poison oak, I couldn’t resist capturing those leaf triplets. I was more taken with the magnificent redwoods, the mighty oaks, and the poisonous plants than I was with the Wolf House. However, I did like the last shot posted here. The stairs seem to beckon one into the structure which is now just a huge stone shell.
