Fabulous Findings on our Family Funtrip!

#8 The Muir Woods

"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe."

--John Muir

The Muir Woods can be found across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Franciso. We had planned to see the Redwoods National Forest but changed our plans last minute. This is the second best place to see Giant Coastal Redwoods, the tallest of all living things.

The tallest coastal redwood at Muir Woods is about 258 feet, approximately the height of a six-foot person stacked head to toe 45 times. The average age is between 600 to 800 years, with the oldest being at least 1200 years old. This is still young for redwoods as they can live up to 2200 years.

"This is the best tree-lovers monument that could possibly be found in all the forests of the world,"

--John Muir 

Family Circles -- There is something so interesting about these giant redwoods: You can't see it very well in this photograph, but hundreds of years ago a single large redwood grew here. Then disaster struck. The trunk of the large redwood was killed, perhaps by repeated and severe wildfire. From where we were standing, we could see the original tree trunk, dead and blackened.

Despite the damage, the tree did not die. Below the ground, it's massive root system was still alive. Before long, hundreds of young, bright green sprouts began to come up around the circle formed by the root crown of the original tree. Some of those sprouts have grown into the full-sized trees that stand today in a circle around the original trunk.

There must be an analogy in here somewhere...