{"id":8686852,"date":"2022-12-12T09:00:53","date_gmt":"2022-12-12T17:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eastbaytimes.com\/?p=8686852&preview=true&preview_id=8686852"},"modified":"2022-12-14T14:07:16","modified_gmt":"2022-12-14T22:07:16","slug":"weekend-getaway-on-the-search-for-giant-trees-in-humboldts-mighty-forests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eastbaytimes.com\/2022\/12\/12\/weekend-getaway-on-the-search-for-giant-trees-in-humboldts-mighty-forests\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekend getaway: On the search for giant trees in Humboldt\u2019s mighty forests"},"content":{"rendered":"

WEOTT, Calif.\u00a0 \u2013 It was an overcast Halloween morning in Humboldt Redwoods State Park, when I went searching for the hidden tree. Again.<\/p>\n

I had walked this alluvial floodplain deep in the woods a handful of times before without finding this elusive coast redwood, an estimated 337 feet tall with an imposing 22.3-foot diameter at breast height. Where could it be?<\/p>\n

I was recounting those misadventures a few years ago, when my friend Heather Pierce, of Eureka, said she knew exactly where that tree stood. It’s her favorite Sequoia sempervirens. During a recent weeklong visit to the thick, verdant forests of Redwood National and State Parks, we took a side trip to Humboldt Redwoods State Park, 80 miles south.<\/p>\n

Whenever I\u2019m at the rooftop of California, I try to include a stop along the Avenue of the Giants, a 32-mile scenic stretch that weaves through big trees and enclaves in southern Humboldt County. From the Bay Area, you can reach Humboldt\u2019s towering trees in about 4 hours, allowing a half day of hiking before continuing your adventures further north or along the coast.<\/p>\n

This part of the Golden State offers plenty of non-redwood delights, too, from the Victorian gingerbread architecture of Ferndale<\/a> to the seaside towns that hug the rugged coast. You can fill an entire weekend with redwood hikes and town rambles. Explore the Grieg-French-Bell Grove just south of Pepperwood along the Avenue of the Giants, say, with its fairyland expanse of lush Irish green sorrel ground cover and threadlike paths among the trees, then head to the coast to grab dinner in Ferndale, Arcata or perhaps Trinidad, where the Moonstone Grill offers cioppino with sunset views.<\/p>\n

\"The
The Grieg-French-Bell Grove at the north end of Avenue of the Giants has a fairytale setting with thick patches of kelly green sorrel. (Photo by Elliott Almond) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Avenue of the Giants has plenty of worthwhile stops, but I’m always drawn by the 9,400-acre Rockefeller Grove, the largest remaining contiguous old-growth coast redwood patch in the world. It\u2019s at the northern end of the Avenue along narrow Mattole Road.<\/p>\n

At 53,000 acres, Humboldt Redwoods is California\u2019s third-largest state park behind Anza-Borrego Desert and Henry W. Coe near Morgan Hill. It boasts 130 trees that are 350 feet or taller. Most of them thrive in the Rockefeller Forest where Bull Creek cuts a rocky path through its heart.<\/p>\n

Heather and I were headed for Bull Creek Flats, which has one of the world\u2019s tallest forest canopies. It\u2019s why the park is a World Heritage Site and an International Biosphere Reserve.<\/p>\n

Coast redwoods exist in a relatively limited band of coastland from just across the Oregon border to the southern fringes of Big Sur. Most of the trees south of Humboldt cannot compete with the mammoths of the North Coast that have thrived in low-lying alluvial flats, along moist creek beds and up gullies and notch valleys. Before the California Gold Rush, trees dating back 2,000 years covered an estimated 2 million acres. Only about 5 percent of the old-growth forests have survived the onslaught of logging.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re lucky any of the groves persevered. Forward-thinking Stephen T. Mather, the first director of the National Park Service, played an important role in helping create the Save the Redwoods League, which raised money to buy the Humboldt groves in the early 1920s. John D. Rockefeller, Jr. spearheaded the purchase of this fabulous forest from the Pacific Lumber Company in 1931.<\/p>\n

We had the Rockefeller forest to ourselves, as most tourists stop along Avenue of the Giants in easy-to-reach places like the Founders Grove, near the confluence of Bull Creek and the Eel River. Visitors can enjoy a self-guided half-mile walk through the temperate forest to the fallen Dyerville Giant.<\/p>\n

\"The
The 370-foot tall Dyerville Giant was felled by a storm in 1991. A half-mile walk takes you from parking lot to this fallen behemoth on the Avenue of the Giants. (Getty Images) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In 1966, UC Berkeley scientist Paul Zinke discovered that tree with the help of a graduate student. Gale-force winds in 1991 knocked down the conifer, making it easier to measure. At a colossal 370 feet, scientists regarded the Dyerville Giant as the world\u2019s tallest tree at the time, although Cal Poly Humboldt botanists and their colleagues have found taller trees since.<\/p>\n

Measurements of living trees are estimates at best, because they keep growing and sometimes the tops of tall ones break off in powerful wind storms. Without climbing the trees and dropping a tape measure, it is difficult to say which one is the tallest.<\/p>\n

So leave room for doubt that 380-foot Hyperion, a regal redwood tucked in a remote drainage in Redwood National Park, actually is the world\u2019s tallest tree.<\/p>\n

The tree we sought is much shorter than Hyperion. I\u2019m more impressed with tree width than height, and this one is reportedly the largest tree in Humboldt Redwoods State Park. As we left the parking lot — where a giant redwood limb once broke off and smashed a car roof 30 feet from me — I felt hopeful I\u2019d finally meet this behemoth.<\/p>\n

The stubborn drought throughout the West proved beneficial, for once, as the usually rushing waterway was dry enough to tiptoe across and reach the trail on the south side of Bull Creek.<\/p>\n

From there, the path rose and fell like a carnival roller coaster through a forest covered with redwood needles, kelly green sorrel and sword ferns. We reached an enormous fallen log Heather called the \u201cRedwood Wall.” Later, she pointed to a gnarled tree she and a friend named \u201cthe Atomic Elephant.\u201d From there, Pierce started a precarious descent to the valley floor.<\/p>\n

Not here, I shouted. I knew the way to the floor from previous sorties. A quarter mile down the trail I found the gully I had used earlier. We followed it to the bottom without too much effort. Heather stopped me as I climbed under a fallen tree and started heading in the direction I had pursued on other visits.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo the right,\u201d she pointed toward the east.<\/p>\n

So that\u2019s why I never saw the tree. I had been searching in the wrong place. Oops. After 100 yards, we encountered the species that eluded me all these years. This time, there was no doubt. The tree dwarfed its skinny neighbors.<\/p>\n

It felt sacred among the trees scattered throughout Bull Creek Flats. The world\u2019s leading redwood authorities balanced spirituality with science as they named and cataloged the leathery-barked beast estimated to be 1,700 years old.