Standing Among the Giants - Sequoia National Park

It’s a simple rule of show business: do what it takes to get asses in the seats. Put Keanu Reeves in a Shakespearean adaptation if it’ll up the gross receipts. Build Celine Dion her own freaking theater in Vegas just to get the easy-listening, king-of-the-world Baccarat crowd to show up at your casino. The same rule applies to national parks – if you’ve got a star, put her on the marquee. Just to get them in the gates and the rest takes care of itself.

So it is with Sequoia National Park. Playing the lead in his ensemble cast of natural wonders is the stunning Giant Sequoia – regal behemoth of the living planet. Of all the giants in the Giant Forest (a grove at roughly 5,000 feet which is home to a bevy of colossal trees), it is the General Sherman tree which stands as the Largest Living Thing on Earth. It’s a title that warrants visual validation; and once viewed, the Sherman does not disappoint. I’ve seen trees, as I would assume most of those living outside of a prison in the tundra have, but this was a monster – 275 feet tall, 36 feet in diameter at the base with bark that is 30 inches thick. Though others are taller or wider at the base, nothing on earth matches the Sherman’s mass. Standing at the foot of it, your mind struggles with its bulk – it is so removed from your mind’s concept of a “tree” that it spins your reality a bit just to stare up at it. At over 2300 years old, its seen more than you, been through more than you, mocks your mobile, feeble shell and stands undaunted – God’s own Louisville Slugger.

But Sequoia has more in store for visitors than its hulking leading man. It’s a kaleidoscope of rugged southern Sierra features. Craggy, brown faces jut out from the green torso of the rolling mountains, with the majestically proud chin of Moro Rock most prominent among them. Foothills turn into mountains at the start of the park, but the mountains present themselves in something of a slideshow of reverse chronology. Ancient, rounded and verdant mounds yield to sharper, angled and taller younger brothers (likely by a few hundred thousand years), equally emerald. These mountains sandwich the meandering Kaweah, a modest and clear river that cleaves the valley. There are even pockets of grassy knolls that peek out from among the trees and rocks, adding a different shade of green. The park seemed to me to be a junior version of Glacier NP in Montana – similar in features and diversity, but just a shade short on the awe-meter overall.

Winding, two-lane General’s Highway (the main road in the park) offers a view of only a fraction of the nearly 866,000 acres of land shared by Sequoia and its sister park King’s Canyon. The parks both have a storied history, having been named the second and third U.S. National Parks in 1890. In the time before the National Park Service was created, these and other parks were watched over by the U.S. Army’s cavalry. Though many came and went during the pre-Park Service days, probably none were more successful than Captain Charles Young and the famed all-black regiment known as the Buffalo Soldiers. Young and his troops made more improvements to the park in the summer of 1903 than had been accomplished in the previous three years. They even completed the first road leading to the Giant Forest, making it easily accessible for future generations to appreciate.

I visited Sequoia in early spring, which had its advantages and disadvantages. The crowds are certainly more reasonable, and the weather is just about perfect, at least at lower elevations. But once you get into the higher climes, snow levels can impede anything but a casual stroll through the many impressive wealds the park offers. A visit during the early fall would probably offer the full complement of natural immersion, and would allow the visitor to truly take in all that the park offers—while avoiding the tourist herds of summer.

After I left the park I stopped off in Three Rivers, the town just outside the gates of the park. I pulled into a coffee shop/used bookstore called The Cabin. The entirely wooden building had a deck and fenced picnic area in the back, each looking down at a slight angle over the Kaweah as it wound away down its well-worn primeval path. Buying a coffee from the owner, I complimented him on the auspicious location.

“Thanks,” he said. “Yep, it’s not bad.”

Understatements have a way of making their conspicuous point. Sequoia National Park was not bad, either. Not bad at all.

Photos property of National Park Service