After searing summer heat and stifling drought fueled savage wildfires which, accelerated by Santa Ana winds, scorched large swaths of California’s spectacular terrain and prohibited access to some of its state and national treasures, and after a surprising October snow storm sealed off other parts of the Sierra Nevada mountain range, we finally arrived for a bucket-list experience we almost delayed too long.
We hiked among — and occasionally hugged — some of largest by volume, and oldest, Giant Sequoia trees on the planet. Fortunate to visit the area on sunny days at the time of peak fall foliage, we saw mountainsides of blackened, branchless tree trunks reaching upward from a palette of brilliant yellow, gold and rust understory.
Evidence of fire was almost everywhere, and we could see by the height of resurgent undergrowth that some of those fires were recent while many occurred years, decades or even centuries ago. Some areas were reminiscent of a graveyard with as many trees on the ground as in the air. Among the horizontal were many victims of old age, many more felled by fires, and others downed by wind storms, including the Mono Wind event of last January 19th which toppled two dozen of the typically shallow-rooted Giant Sequoia trees in Yosemite’s still spectacular Mariposa Grove.
We learned that Giant Sequoias grow rapidly and grow old gracefully, developing the thickest skins of any tree species….bark that is fire resistant and can become more than a foot thick. This species can usually survive the fires to which other trees succumb….fires which are necessary to release the seeds from its thousands of egg-sized cones. We also learned that when a Giant Sequoia falls, it doesn’t decay like other trees; and we witnessed Giant Sequoias which had fallen hundreds of years ago with only slight deterioration to show for it.
Yosemite National Park hosts three Giant Sequoia groves — Mariposa Grove at the park’s southern border and the smaller Tuolumne and Merced Groves at the park’s western border. A two-hour drive away is Grants Grove, the only portion of the Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Parks complex that is open due to dangerous conditions following wildfires sparked by lightning strikes in September or the winter storm of October. Here the hiking is short — more like a short stroll — but the Giant Sequoias are in excellent condition….including the 1650-year-old General Grant Tree which is more than 100 feet in circumference at its base.
It was humbling to stand in the presence of a living creature that was alive in the Fourth Century AD.
A walk in the woods — any woods — can be an almost religious experience; but perhaps no where is it more spiritual than during a walk among the these gentle giants.
JER
ALL OVER THE MAP 