Big Basin Redwoods State Park in summer 2012, part 1

This post is the first of two. To see more Big Basin photos, click here.

AFTER DESERT TRAVEL, A CHANGE OF SCENERY

Maybe we were reacting to three weeks spent in a hot dry faraway place earlier in the year, or maybe it was our desire to expand beyond the structure of Bev's RV. Whatever the reason, as the summer lingered on, my aunt Sundari and I found ourselves wanting to camp in tents in the forest. We wanted cool green shade, the presence of ancient tree spirits, a feeling of being protected after the exposure we'd experienced on the windy, wide open desert plains. And this woodland destination had to be close to home, because just like last year with our trip to Pinnacles National Park, we only had a couple of days to spare. Known to be gorgeous and only an hour's drive away, Big Basin Redwoods State Park was the most appealing option.

This 19,000 acre park extends from the mountains to the sea. I'd only been to Big Basin once before, to shoot engagement photos back in 2009 when I was still a Red Bat Photographer. It was time for me to return without the pre-matrimony-documentation imperative. Sundari and I left Santa Cruz and took Highway 9 up to Boulder Creek, to conduct reconnaissance at the park and figure out where we would camp in a few weeks, when the time was nigh for tents and days off. The weather that afternoon was sublime, hot on the sunny stretches of the road and then cool as new dawn under the heights of the redwoods. Rays of sunlight found their way through parted leaves and down across our path.

Near the headquarters of the park, on the Redwood Loop Trail, we paid homage to some giant trees. We saw and touched the Mother of the Forest, who is 329 feet tall, and the Father of the Forest, who's the widest and perhaps the oldest, somewhere around 2,000 years old. We got inside the Chimney Tree, a living, growing, completely hollow redwood, and looked up through its burn-blackened spout. In the parking lot we ate ham sandwiches and agreed that yes, this place would do nicely for our summer escape.

A PHOTOGRAPHER'S CRUSADE

Big Basin is the oldest state park in California, and it owes the essential moment of its preservation to a photographer. In 1899, Andrew Hill was taking pictures in a redwood grove in Felton as part of a magazine assignment. The landowner harassed him, wanting payment for the use of the trees as photographic subjects, and practically boasted that these giants would end up as firewood and railroad ties. This attitude on the landowner's part got Andrew Hill very irate. He vowed that day to save the giant trees, and began planning ways to enlist the help of likeminded friends in his new cause.

The redwoods he photographed that day were not actually part of what is now Big Basin, but rather another nearby park-to-be, Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park. Hill's attention soon turned to Big Basin when he realized the trees there were even more ancient and enormous. The next year, Hill and friends camped at Big Basin and formed the Sempervirens Club, which still exists today as the Sempervirens Fund. It was through their constant lobbying efforts, and those of their prominent allies, that a bill was passed to purchase this land to create California's first state park. Known initially as California Redwood Park, it now contains some the last 3% of old growth redwoods remaining today. If Hill hadn't worked so hard to save this forest, it would've been stripped of its virgin trees within six months.

Hill continued to spend summers at Big Basin and photograph it until his death in 1922. He even had a photography store in the park. This was one of many amenities the park offered as it grew in size. It also acquired an inn, restaurant, barber shop, post office, gas station, tennis courts, and a swimming pool. These were the days when people would camp all summer long at Big Basin, before the automobile became a popular means of travel. It must have been wonderful to stay at the park back then; even now, it feels remote and isolated, and back then it must have felt like a true sanctuary.

A PLACE TO HIDE

Long before Andrew Hill's efforts to protect Big Basin, these redwoods were a home for prehistoric people, though for years there was a popular misconception that early native Californians never lived here. Evidence has been found, however, to indicate that they did– like milling stations, the hollowed out depressions in rock used for pounding acorn meat into flour, visible from several trails in the park. Another intriguing archaeological find at Big Basin was that of five projectile points made of obsidian from Napa. This valuable discovery proved that the various Ohlone tribes who lived on the coast were in contact with natives of the interior of California, and were trading shells in exchange for obsidian.

Big Basin held valuable animal and plant resources for the Ohlone, as well as special places that were sacred in their traditions. And later, during the time when the Spanish occupied this area and aggressivly converted the native Californians they found, Big Basin became a hideout for Ohlone people escaping brutality. As I described in this earlier post about Santa Cruz history, the Spanish priests brought native people into their missions, calling them "neophytes" and training them to forsake their own language and culture in favor of becoming Catholics. When they tried to leave, they were punished, usually with lashes, sometimes with death. Among those who did escape, some found refuge in the forested areas of Big Basin, in a village headed by a leader of the Quiroste tribe.

The Quiroste leader, named Charquin, had once been a neophyte himself at another mission, escaping after just eight days as a neophyte. He established a refuge in these redwoods and opened it to other natives wishing to leave Mission Santa Cruz. After two years of hiding out and resisting the Spanish, Charquin was captured and taken to Mission Santa Barbara, but the movement he had led continued even after his capture. A party of Quiroste men stormed Mission Santa Cruz in 1793, not long after Charquin was seized, in what may be the only direct attack on a mission building in central California during the era of Spanish rule. The attempt was quashed immediately. This crucial, brief moment of open Ohlone rebellion against Spanish imperialism was launched from the silence of the forest at Big Basin.

WALK-IN SITES AND HERMAPHRODITES

On our afternoon visit in 2012, over two hundred years after Charquin's resistance, we knew nothing of what had gone on here before. But we didn't need to know the past of this place to feel the deep quiet under these ancient trees. Ignorant of history, we talked about how safe the forest at Big Basin felt, how easy it would be to hide from the world here. We found the park's walk-in campsites and decided where we would stay when we came back in a few weeks: in a spot out of sight of all cars and buildings, up on a wooded hill. Now that we'd chosen our destination, I was ready to camp right then, just curl up under a tree and sleep for the next few days.

Reluctant to drive home, we walked on a few more paths, pausing often to examine moss and bark on the damp forest floor. Redwoods towered above us. The bodies of fallen trees had been used as turning points by the workers who had built these trails. It felt like it would be easy to round a bend and disappear forever behind one of these enormous carcasses. Like an enchanted forest in which a thousand years can pass in a day, there is something about Big Basin that whispers: don't leave. 

We saw dozens of banana slugs, and watched their slow and steady progress over logs and leaf litter. These fascinating animals, visible wherever there are redwoods, are hermaphrodites who reproduce by exchanging sperm with each other. As you might be able to see in the photo below, they have two pairs of tentacles on their heads. The upper set – the eyestalks –  detects light and movement, and the smaller, lower set detects chemicals. Capable of moving at a speed of 6.5 inches per minute, they don't stay put for long. A slug I had my eye on would disappear if I turned away to take a picture of something else. There's something innocent and alien about these glossy yellow creatures. Watching them move in the forest that day, their eyestalks a-waving in the occasional beams of light let in by the trees, only added to the sense of quiet unreality I felt at Big Basin. I could hardly wait to come back and feel it again.