Giant Sequoia National Park is located in the higher altitudes of the Sierra Nevada Range in California, and is therefore accessible only by this very long and winding road. But the time spent to reach there is well worth the effort, as suddenly the forest becomes absolutely enormous. While the trees here are perhaps a shade shorter than the more often visited coastal redwoods found near the populated California Coast, giant sequoias are much more massive than coastal redwoods by being many times thicker in girth (diameter). The giant sequoia was named by the Austrian linguist and botanist Stephen L. Endlicher in honor of Sequoyah, the Cherokee Nation man who designed the Cherokee syllabary that made reading and writing in Cherokee possible. Before completing this task, Sequoyah was completely illiterate as his people had no method of reading or writing. So he completed the arduous task of designing the written language, allowing himself to become literate in the process. He eventually settled on creating 85 characters, similar to letters in other languages, but instead of representing a single letter, each symbol represented an entire syllable, allowing for much shorter words than other languages. Stephen Endlicher was so impressed by this feat that he named the mighty tree after Sequoyah. And wow are these trees impressive! Part of what makes them so impressive isn’t just how thick they are at the base; it is that they do not taper off on the way up but instead retain a consistent girth (diameter) over the entire height. Combine this with a typical diameter of 15 to 25 feet, and the result is one massively thick tree! The above image does a great job of illustrating this as a tree with a diameter around 25 feet is shown to retain its thickness up into its first branches. A sense of scale is sort of missing here until you realize that the lower branches of sequoias themselves are thicker than most trees, being easily several feet thick themselves. It is also common for the very lowest branches of sequoias to be up to 150 feet off of the ground, so that the massive columnar trunks are very visible. The Wild Images captured the above photo during one of our visits to Sequoia National Park. Another giant sequoia can be seen on the right side of the image, but the remaining trees are much smaller species. Technically there is one more giant sequoia in the photo, seen with its needle crown sticking out to the right of the trunk near the bottom center. However, the bulk of this tree is hidden from view. While giant sequoias are found in groves, the clusters of sequoias are always surrounded by other pines that are often themselves of great height but much less in girth. The difference in bark colors are pretty apparent. The giant sequoia bark has a very orange red color, leading to their inclusion as a type of redwood, in contrast to the gray bark found on other pines in the area. This allows the sequoias to be noticed at large distances even in very thick pine forests. The Wild Images Team has captured many other photos from California such as the scene of a blooming thunderstorm over Joshua Tree National Park, the lava flow created streaked ridge in Lassen Volcanic National Park, and the high altitudes where a giant sequoia is larger and redder than others, the steep Hyde Street view of Alcatraz Island and San Francisco Bay, the drastic slope of the abrupt drop off of Taylor Street, the Pine Street colorful terraced houses with background buildings, the historic looking beautiful terraced houses and a Classic VW Beetle, and the Asian inspired intricately ornate Chinatown scene, each of which are available for sale in our store. Blog posts from California have documented the long and winding road climb to the giants of Sequoia National Park, the size comparison of The Wild Images Team Coordinator Christina and the giant tree, the massive view where giant sequoias maintain their diameters over hundreds of feet, an overlook into the Merced River Valley with Liberty Cap, the road heading towards the sheer monolith of El Capitan, the road heading towards desolate ridges of Joshua Tree National Park, the location where the road rises out of Bumpass Hell, a beach dune covered view of the secret underground World War II bunker, the reflective tower of the Marriott Marquis over the Yerba Buena Gardens, the distinctively ornate Asian architecture and decor of Chinatown, the musically inspired melting records with album covers mural, the long strange trip of the Grateful Dead Jerry Garcia mural, the places where steep sidewalks have stairs cut into them, the street where a tree gives a sense of the steepness, the expansive view of Nob Hill from Telegraph Hill and the oppositely directed view from Telegraph Hill to the northeast, the descent in the upper portion of the Filbert Steps, followed by the middle portion of the Filbert Steps with a pose by The Wild Images Team Coordinator on the steps, followed by the lower portion of the Filbert Steps, and at the bottom a view up the Filbert Street steps again with a pose by The Wild Images Team Coordinator below the steps. From our travels in the nearby Oregon and Washington, we have captured photos such as the deep blue hues of swirled clouds and rim peaks reflected in Crater Lake, the Hoh Rainforest green moss covers every possible branch, and the right place at the right time rainbow over the Mt. St. Helens remnants, each of which are available for sale in our store. Blog posts from Oregon and Washington include the sharp looking view through the Lava Cast Forest, the optical illusion of blue waters and white streaks in Crater Lake, the starkly colorful rainbow rises over the devastation of Mt. St. Helens, the moment The Wild Images Team Coordinator Christina is imprisoned by rainforest tree roots, the interesting story of the Port Angeles waterfront Rocktopus Sculpture, and its accompanying bronze plaque of charitable organizations.
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