The Giant Sequoias

On August 28 we drove up the switchback road into the main part of Sequoia National Park, to see the big trees.

Here is one of the first spots we stopped- this is "Auto log", a tree that fell in 1917.  In the early days of car travel into the park, this was a log that cars would drive onto to take pictures on.

Here's Ed sitting in it's roots:

One of the first groves of trees we came to.  That's itty-bitty me in the purple shirt at the lower right:

The road goes through a fallen tree in one place:

This is Crescent meadow, we hiked around here.

Me at the base of another giant sequoia:

This is Tharp's log.  He was a guy that used to graze livestock in the park during the summer, around the time the land was first made into a park.  He would spend the summers in this fallen log that he turned into a cabin.

Here's the interior of Tharp's log, showing his table, and bed frame towards the rear:

Me again, crouching in the base of a giant sequoia.  There's no lack of headroom inside, I'm just crouching for the camera:

I was taking a photo of Ed standing in the entrance of a Sequoia, and told him to back up and get right inside for a better photo.  He did, and then suddenly disappeared and I heard a "thunk".  He'd fallen around 4 feet right into the tree, he hadn't noticed that the ground dropped away.  This one looks like it was hollowed out by fire, as so many are.  Giant Sequoias usually survive forest fires once they get to a certain size.

Just before sundown we went to see the General Sherman tree, which is the largest living thing on earth.  They use this little stone patio along the trail to the tree to demonstrate the huge footprint it takes up:

... and here is the General himself, or the base of him, anyway:

Here are a couple of panorama shots Ed put together from this day to show the immense size of the trees.  They are so big that you certainly can't get a whole one in one photo frame:

Coming up next, a hike up Moro Rock, so don't go away...