The Journey IS the Destination #10: Sequoia!

"In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks."
- John Muir, 1877

John Muir, founder of the Sierra Club, was one of the first modern preservationists, whose direct activism helped to save the Yosemite Valley and other wilderness areas. His writings and philosophy strongly influenced the formation of the modern environmental movement.

After a wonderful evening at the Exeter Best Western, Jas and I headed into the Sequoia National Park. We knew headed in that this was going to be an amazing leg of our trip. Happily, we were not disappointed. Come with us...and check out what turned out to be one of the most amazing sights we've ever seen.

(Wait! There's more Sequoias...)

Take a look at the map above - near the bottom is where we entered the park and way up at the top you'll see our approximate "finish" point. All told we spent 10 hours in the park, roughly 40 miles inside. No backpacking or hiking - we'd park the car and take pictures, walk around some smaller trails, check out the visitor centers (there's three in all) and eat.

First spring I ever drank out of. That's Jas.

Wikipedia states: Sequoia National Park is a national park in the southern Sierra Nevada. It was established in 1890 as the second U.S. national park, after Yellowstone National Park. The park spans 404,051 acres and contains the highest point in the contiguous 48 United States, Mount Whitney, at 14,505. The park is south of Kings Canyon National Park; the two are administered by the National Park Service as one unit, called Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks.

Our first encounter with the gigantic Sequoia.

Huge bastards, aren't they? We've all seen the pictures. We've seen 20 lumberjacks from 1908 standing shoulder-to-shoulder against a Sequoia and thought, "that's big" - and then forgot about it. You have to see these monsters to appreciate them. Trust me.

Course, Jas took pictures of me and I took pictures of him so here we both are in front of one of the trees.

20 elephants high. The Lodgepole Visitor Center and Village has a great museum that tells you everything you need to know about the park, redwoods, sequoias, history, etc. There's a gift shop, restaurant, campground, picnic areas and general store for camping supplies.

John R. White, the first park super. It's due to his passion and efforts that this park exists today. Lodgepole used to be a thriving mini-city up until 1996 and then the park got wise that the hustle and bustle of a "city" amongst the Sequoia was slowly killing them. The amusement park feel was abandoned and what replaced it, I think, is appropriate.

I forgot John Muir's family had first settled in Wisconsin after emigrating from Scotland. My brother and I and many, many members of our family - both sides - and our friends have such a fondness for nature. We hunt and fish and take vacations "Up North" and wonder at the silence on a lake at night or at the sound of a loon off in the distance. The stars - so many more stars are found "in nature". The smell of pine. The deer or fox or beaver in its natural habitat. It's all quite overwhelming. It's our Church in the woods.

General Sherman, one of the tallest Giant Sequoia trees in the world with a height of about 275 feet and the largest tree in terms of volume, making it the world's largest known single organism by volume.

It's max diameter is 39.5 feet. Stand against a wall and walk 13 passes. Add a half a foot and turn around....that's huge. The tree is believed to be between 2,300 and 2,700 years old.

In the north of Grant Grove stands the General Grant, named after Ulysses S. Grant in 1867, Union Army general and the 18th President of the United States (1869-1877). It is 268 ft. high, with a maximum diameter of 40 ft. - 2nd largest of all Giant Sequoias, the largest within the Grant Grove and third largest tree in the world (by volume).

President Calvin Coolidge proclaimed it the "Nation's Christmas Tree" in 1926. In 1956, President Dwight D. Eisenhower declared the tree a "National Shrine", a memorial to those who died in war...and the only living object to be so declared. Once thought to be well over 2,000 years old, recent estimates point to a much younger age closer to 1,650 years.

Within the Grant Grove is this tree. Read the story below.

‘One day I was full of life. My sap was rich and I was strong. From seed to tree I grew so tall. Through wind and rain I could not fall. But now my branches suffer and my leaves don’t offer poetry to men of song...Oh, Lord I lay me down. No life’s left to be found. There’s nothing left for me.’*

*Brian Wilson and Jack Rieley, from “A Day in The Life Of A Tree”, [1971], Brother Publishing Co., (BMI)/Wixen Music Publishing, Inc.

The Brian Wilson lyric above is appropriate for this area. We felt like we were in a cemetary. Converse Basin is a sequoia grove located in Kings Canyon National Park in the Sierra Nevada in eastern California. It includes the Boole tree, the sixth largest tree in the world. Purchased by Charles Porter Converse in 1868, the basin contained the largest grove of sequoia trees, but most were logged between 1892 and 1918. Now only perhaps 60 large specimens survive out of thousands. If you can read the diagram below, you'll be able to get a feel what the lumber operation was like which stood on this spot over one hundred years ago.

Initially, a 54-mile flume was built to transport wood from the mountain mills to the drying yards and box factory in Sanger, an engineering feat completed in just over a year. For several years, millions of board feet of lumber — cedars, firs and pines, as well as redwoods — went down the flume, but the venture never showed a profit. Giant sequoia wood is soft and brittle and it becomes more so as the tree ages. The sheer size and weight of the trees often caused them to shatter as they fell upon the forest floor - leaving a dead, useless tree. Some trees were brought down with the help of blasting powder, which also destroyed a good portion of the tree. Hundreds of men worked the logging operations and traces of their presence can still be seen. The original mill site can easily be located from the remaining logs and skidways that fed into the mill. Logging was a dangerous occupation and accidents and deaths were common. Wooden coffins carrying the dead were sent down the flume to be buried in the Sanger Cemetery. The living also rode the flume. It was used as both a mode of transportation and as an early day amusement ride. The steep grade provided many with the thrill of a lifetime. A railroad was eventually built. It helped transport logs, but increased expenses.

By 1896, the company was in dire straits. A new Converse Basin mill was built, but the company continued to falter. It was sold to the Hume-Bennett Lumber Company in late 1905. The new owners made improvements and reached full production in 1910, but soon discovered that logging sequoias was not profitable. In 1935, Hume sold the mountain property to the U.S. Forest Service for an average price of $14.93 per acre.

Just before Jas stepped into this tree, he yelled out, "Stop. Don't move." We're hunters and "stop" means stop and shut up. He saw this deer coming up the hill to the right of the tree and snapped off this picture. She saw us and continued meandering around the back of the tree and back down the hill.

Luckily we had our bow and arrows with us and let off a couple when her back was turned. Mmmm. Nothing like Sequoia mulie. Whoo! I'm kidding. We missed her.

The park - and all that was in it - left Jason and I quite breathless. So much so that we were reluctant to return to civilization.

Seen enough Sequoia for a lifetime? If you were with us, you might disagree. One more shot? Goodbye Sequoia National Park. You were everything we'd thought you'd be and more. Jas and I are already talking about a trip back to do some hardcore backpacking and tent camping.