Day 23 - Sequoia National Park

Saturday, July 2, 2016

Posted from: Visalia, CA

Miles driven: 144

Total trip miles: 4,114

National parks visited: 11

Wow. Just wow. I don't even know how to begin this post. Sequoia National Park is just...wow. 

We are camping an hour outside of the national park, AND it is 4th of July weekend, so it was really important that we got up early this morning and got on the road. 

First, the welcome sign was the best so far. (Notice how we don't even try to stand next to each other in selfies anymore.)

This picture is a little washed out with the sun, but the valley was georgeous as we drive into the park.

After a few miles of tummy turning curvy roads (the most curvy and nauseating yet!), we rounded a corner and suddenly we were in the Giant Forest. This is where the biggest tree in the world lives. 

The kids are standing in an outline of the worlds biggest tree. We couldn't fit it all in the frame!

The worlds biggest tree: The General Sherman 

Of course, the pictures don't do these trees justice at all. They are crazy big. 

This picture is almost worthless because it doesn't look like there is anyone in it for reference...then you realize that there ARE people walking around the base of it. Good luck finding them. It's like finding ants.

#perspective

Again, we can't fit the base of the tree in the frame. The kids are standing in front of the tree's fire scar. Most of them have one. These trees seem to survive everything including forest fires. In fact the NEED forest fires to survive. That is how their cones open up and seeds germinate.

Photographer Caleb took this picture. 

Though it is hard to believe, Sequoia is about more than just the trees. The Sierra Nevada mountains were beautiful. 

We hiked up onto Moro Rock. This is a very steep hike that is a little like climbing Half Dome in Yosemite. This is not for the faint of heart. And the elevation is above 7,000 feet. But the views are amazing.

Here we are at the top.

Going down. Some of the passages were quite narrow. The red backpack between Cameron and Caleb is someone on the trail ahead of us. 

A few switchbacks. Much of the trail was single lane, so there was waiting and negotiating involved.

The railing at the top of this picture shows where we were. This picture was taken from about 1/3 of the way down.

The Tunnel Log!! We were so excited to get here early and get a picture of the truck driving under the log, but as I read the information they hand you when you drive in, I realized that they had the road closed due to the holiday traffic. You can only get here by shuttle. We were bummed, but it was still neat to see.

These are the roots of the Tunnel Log.

I loved these little delicate pink and yellow flowers.

This picture shows how big a sequoia is compared to other big things. The redwood tree is the tallest. I couldn't get the top in the picture, but the sequoias (to the left of the red wood) are the largest by mass. The other large pine to the right of the red wood is a sugar pine. This tree has pine cones that are up to a foot long. 

We had a busy morning of hiking and staring in awe at the giant trees. We had a picnic lunch and headed down the hill (curvy roads from he**) around 1:00. As we neared the entrance we saw a line of cars. It was about 2:00 in the afternoon. (It takes about an hour to get down the mountain to the entrance.) Matt and I counted the cars for the next several minutes. There were 289!!! It went on and on, and it wasn't moving fast. This is why we go early. 

On our way home we stopped at a road side stand and bought some produce. They had fresh sweet corn!!! So dinner looked like this. Yum! (The corn was good, but it wasn't Iowa corn. No peaches and cream.)