Scotia and Eureka 27 Sept 2013

 We journeyed into town to pick up a few groceries.  On our way, we passed the small town of Scotia.  It's easy to see what powers the economy here.  In this photo, stickered, drying lumber is in the foreground and sustainably harvested redwood logs are in the background.  Down the road a bit is a redwood planer mill that converts these rough-sawn pieces of lumber into finished product for shipment to your local lumber yard.  Despite the popular concept, the Coast Redwood is one of the fastest growing trees in North America.

 Scotia was, for most of its existence, a company town.  All of the houses on this block are, except for color, exactly identical.  They are occupied by employees or retirees of the sawmill. 

The Scotia Inn has hosted guests since 1888.  It burned in the early 1900s and was replaced in 1923.

The electricity for the mill and the town are generated in this biomass plant.  Bet you can guess what powers it.  Yep, sawdust and combustible waste from the sawmill, although some agricultural waste is accepted.  It was, until 2003 also owned by the sawmill.  As a part of a chapter 11 reorganization, it along with some houses and businesses, sold by the company.

 Scotia is justifiably proud of its logging heritage.  Unfortunately, this logging museum was closed.  Note the columns made from perfectly sized redwood logs.

 Outside the museum, this big triple-spool steam donkey was, no doubt, the power behind a high lead yarder.  The gear-drive Heisler locomotive is equipped with wheels that were designed to run over a track constructed of small logs rather than steel rails.  Logs were hauled to a landing from which they could be loaded onto a larger train running on steel rails for transport to the sawmill.

This small single-spool steam-donkey was likely used to pull logs along the ground by means of long ropes or steel cables.

A few miles further north, Eureka was for years also powered by lumber, but also had and still has commercial fishing fleets.   Like much of the northwest coast, it also profited from the gold rush.  In the old town section, there are a number of cool, nicely restored buildings like this,

 and these.

This is one of two old GP9s, accompanied by a GP7,  sitting just to the north of old town.  They were refugees of the old Northwest Pacific Railroad.    According to a post on a website, they are destined to be shipped to a shop in Boise, ID where they will be completely revamped and brought into compliance with EPA standards for the resurrection of the NWPRR.