Big Basin Redwoods State Park in summer 2012, part 2

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

TENTS, CARTS, DIRT, DELICIOUSNESS

Vacation arrived a few weeks later. We were off, roaring up Highway 9, talking at high speed about everything that was happening in the crazy, unpredictable world of summer 2012. We chattered energetically, burning off excess mental fuel. Soon we would ensconce ourselves in a redwood grove in order to become further from the outward actions of the humans in our lives and closer to our own inner realities. There would be meditation and contemplation under the trees, insights on the trails, illuminating dreams during outdoor sleep. I would boil the water for my coffee every morning with a WhisperLite stove, and write in my journal while sitting in a camping chair. My clothes would be covered with dust and redwood debris, and I wouldn't have to care about it.

Before we could reach that state of arboreal relaxation, though, we had to carry our camping gear and food from the car and up a steep slope to the walk-in site we'd chosen. That's the trouble with walk-in sites: you have to walk to them, and so does all your stuff. I had foreseen this hurdle and had brought along a granny cart, one of those big wire baskets with wheels and a handle, usually employed to wheel groceries and laundry around town. My granny cart, seldom used since I'd moved into a house with a washing machine, turned out to be perfect for reducing the number of up-and-down-the-hill trips we had to make. I swelled with pride and self-satisfaction over my own ingenuity as I used it to haul up coolers, tents, sleeping bags. It was amazing how much could fit into that thing, and how much gratification I found in pushing it up that hill.   

Here are some things I love about tent camping. I love how everything gets kind of dirty immediately upon arrival, and it stops mattering after the first few hours (to me, anyway). Of course, there are kinds of dirtiness that I never enjoy, such as the muddy dirtiness of camping in the rain, but this trip to Big Basin didn't involve any of those; it was mostly just the dust that characterizes the dry height of summer here, and smudges of grease from our campstove. I love cooking on a campstove–even when it's a WhisperLite that's tricky to balance on a hillside picnic table–and creating a delicious meal far away from a kitchen. Almost anything tastes good to me when eaten outdoors, and I enjoy the new combinations of foods I always end up trying on a camping trip. 

Another thing I love: the way a campsite becomes a small kingdom, and my tent a palace. Every time I pitch my tent, I'm creating a new land for myself, with boundaries marked by objects like rocks and logs. I like to stare at these objects and mentally claim the area they enclose as my own personal property. This must be the fort-building little kid in me coming out, inspired by the strangeness of sleeping without walls. At night, darkness makes the distances greater between campsites, and the light in my tent is like my own personal moon.

What a pleasure it is walking around the campground at night, when everyone's too blinded by their own lanterns to see me lurking. I try not to be creepy about it as I glance into the middle of each little settlement of campers to see what they're eating and what kind of gear they brought along. There it is, yet another world that doesn't include me at all, I always think with profound relief. This intimacy with organisms in the campground extends to plant life too, of course. Sleeping in a tent instead of a vehicle means many more moments are spent observing leaves and bark, and photographs inevitably follow such observation. I had my Canon EF 100mm macro lens with me, and got very close to some compelling surfaces.

COUNTERCLOCKWISE, AND THOSE WHO WALK ON WATER

The longest, most interesting hike we took during our camping trip was the waterfall loop, which we  accidentally did backwards from the way we'd planned. We intended to start with a portion of the Skyline-to-the-sea Trail, then take Berry Creek Falls Trail, and then Sunset Trail back to our starting point. This route would allow us to experience the least difficult portion of the trail in the morning while we were still sleepy. At least, I think that was the reasoning we employed at the time.

To our surprise, the hike got difficult very soon. Lots of ups and downs, piles of rocks to climb. Sweating, we wondered how hard the supposedly more strenuous second half of the hike would be. We didn't realize we'd started with Sunset Trail. This path took us over canyons and streams, mixed woodlands containing stands of redwoods, tan oak trees, Douglas firs, and lots of ferns by the water. We were hiking fairly quickly for the terrain, because we thought we were doing the easy section first and wanted to make good time. I became euphoric from the exercise and the sensation of rambling in the woods. We passed through several distinctly different habitats, and found interesting bugs near the water, especially on West Waddell Creek, where we saw butterflies and dragonflies. We also saw water striders, those members of the insect family known as Gerridae, and I was glad I had the macro lens with me for that.

Gerridae are fascinating creatures. They appear almost anywhere on the planet where water is found, and they're the only family of insects who have members capable of living on the open ocean. They're able to walk on water, partly because their bodies are covered with water-repelling microhairs, and partly because of the way their bodies distribute weight over the water's surface layer. I was mesmerized by the way water striders moved and sat on the surface of the little pools we encountered. I later learned that the movement of their legs actually creates a semi-circular wave under them that they push against to propel themselves forward, and this is how they are able to move so quickly. Sometimes they're cannibals, and will not hesitate eat their own young. They don't do it out of spite; Gerridae are in fact incapable of recognizing their own family members.

THERE'S A WORD FOR THAT THING I LIKE

We left the Gerridae to live out their lives in their own bizarre and graceful way, and kept hiking. Our trail twisted and turned through forest containing increasingly fewer redwoods, and then unexpectedly we were emerging from the trees onto a hillside of bald white rock, where manzanitas and other chaparral-type plants were growing. This sudden exposure to a brilliant, cloud-spattered blue sky dazzled me for a moment. We could see greenery and canyons all around us, in a high-up view I hadn't known was possible from the trail that had led us for miles along the forest floor. I remember the way the sun's heat instantly dried the perspiration on my skin, and how I could taste the chalky dust of the trail in my mouth.

I was intrigued by the change from dark to light, from canopy cover to open sky. On the upper reaches of these slopes, several plant communities existed side by side, their differences quite visible. I had walked from one into the other, feeling for where one ended and another began. What forces determined which plant groups would appear in which places? Was there a word for the boundary between them? The word I was looking for that day, as I later discovered, was ecotone: the transitional area between two ecological communities. I have realized that I am an ecotone afficionado. Transitional areas always appeal to me, and this one was especially lovely.

After-the-fact research taught me that it's the terrain that makes the rules for where plants grow. Water availability and soil composition, both influenced by the location and composition of the underlying earth, create habitats for certain species. On the elevated rock outcropping we were above the reach of the coastal fog that nurtures redwoods during the hotter parts of the year, so redwoods were mostly absent, except in small, isolated groups. All around us were manzanitas, which are specially adapted to thrive in drier environments. Soon we left those behind and found ourselves walking under the shelter of oak trees, whose elegant branches and sharp-pointed leaves threw a lacy shadow pattern on the ground.  

AN EAGER APPROACH, A LUNCHTIME IDYLL, AND AN INCOMPLETE BACKSTORY

Now we walked easily through the forest on a trail grown flat and smooth. We began to see more redwoods; our path grew darker in their shade, mysterious after our brief time in the midday sun. The air around us felt delectably cool. After a while, I heard a faraway liquid sound, and saw the sign directing us to the Berry Creek Falls Trail. With a tiny inward leap of the heart I realized I was excited about seeing these waterfalls for the first time. I remembered how, as a child, I was thrilled by the very idea of a waterfall, and pleased beyond measure by any chance to actually encounter one in real life. I recalled the awed reactions I'd overheard in grownups and children alike at Yosemite's Bridal Veil Falls. We never really lose that waterfall excitement, I thought. I wonder why?  

As we drew closer to the series of waterfalls on Berry Creek Falls Trail, we suddenly and belatedly grasped the fact that we'd gone counterclockwise by accident on this daylong hike. Sundari had been on this trail once before, on a previous visit to Big Basin. She'd taken it in the opposite direction, the clockwise way, and now recognized enough landmarks to realize what had happened. "That means we've already done the hardest part of the hike," she said. "We get to walk down the waterfalls, rather than up!" I was conscious of how tired I was, wobbly in the legs from all the up-and-down tramping of the first five miles or so of our trek. Hearing that we were finished with the hard part was welcome news. The moment felt even sweeter because it was lunchtime, and we were about to eat next to Golden Cascade, the waterfall at the very top.

Golden Cascade streams down over orange-red sandstone, and when a ray of sunlight hits the slick rock, it glows in a color that's something like gold, but not exactly. We watched the water moving as we ate sandwiches, mesmerized by the beauty of this spot. After rest and sustenance had restored us, Sundari donned swimming apparel and jumped into the icy pool at the bottom of the falls. I was not so brave. I wandered around taking pictures instead, because these were the kinds of shots the wide-angle lens was made for. 

Her hair still wet from the plunge, Sundari led the way down the steep rock steps carved into the side of the slope of waterfalls. We paused on a precipice and looked down at Silver Falls, the next in the series, named because of its silvery appearance as it drops 50 feet straight down over the rock face. "This reminds me of some places I saw in Hawaii," said Sundari, who had spent the previous summer there on the Big Island. "Wow, really?" I said, picturing that, newly determined now to visit Hawaii someday. We clambered down the steps to get a closer look at Silver Falls from below, and crossed Berry Creek to reach the foot of the cascade. I was amazed by the loveliness of this section of trail, with its wet dark rock surrounded by leaves and fallen logs. We seemed to be standing within the soul of Big Basin's forest, a place where all was quiet except for the roar of falling water, and where the color green expressed itself in a wide, subtle gradient of hues.

Long after this trip was done, I wondered how Berry Creek got its name, and looked into the matter. According to various internet sources, Tilford George Berry was a lumberjack from Indiana, an early land speculator in Boulder Creek, who built a cabin next to these waterfalls in the 1860s. He was a loner, with no wife, no children, not even a pet for company. He kept his rifle close to him at all times. I wonder what it would be like to live as he did, in this magical little dreamland under giant trees, rarely seeing another person. I remember the trail that led from Silver Falls to Berry Creek Falls, how it was covered with delicate ferns and flowers and moss, and interrupted by tall, tilting redwoods. That section of trail was approximately where Berry's cabin was located. He couldn't have picked a more gorgeous place for his home anywhere in the area. What was this man like? What did he do in his secret life? How did he feel about these waterfalls? Why did he choose to live here, alone?

Berry's story has an enigmatic ending, which seems fitting for one who lived a solitary life in Big Basin, land of the hideout, the escape, the secret sanctuary. Sometime in the 1870s, Berry asked a friend to hold his rifle for a few days, then disappeared for two weeks. When he came back, he was disheveled and dirty. He took his rifle and left, offering no explanation to his friend, and was never seen again. 25 years later, not far from the place where he disappeared, a local doctor found Berry's skeleton with his rifle leaning against it. There was a single bullet hole in the skull. Was this suicide? Murder? Nobody knows; the man's life was a mystery to those around him. The doctor who found his bones wired them together and hung the skeleton in his office, where it stayed for many years. Eventually, Tilford George Berry got lost again, and the world lost track of his bones. It's interesting that he got to be a skeleton in a doctor's office for so many years, which is more posthumous attention than is usually paid to the average person's earthly remains. He may have steered clear of people during his life, perpetually seeking privacy, but he was physically exposed to an unusual degree after his death. Though a loner, it was his fate to keep a lot of people company.

The tale of George Tilford Berry with its many ironies is endlessly fascinating to me, but I'll save further speculation for another time and place; on the day of that visit to Big Basin, I was completely unaware of it. Continuing on the trail, we reached Berry Creek Falls, 60 feet high and falling down over cliff-clinging moss. This was the most breathtaking cascade of them all, and we stared at it for a while, lingering to admire the perfect composition of waterfall and collapsed trees, the vividness of the green beside the shining chute of liquid. Then we walked back along the Skyline-to-the-Sea Trail, toward headquarters and our campsite, on a long, luxurious path that rose gradually through more redwoods. After a while, the trail turned to offer one more view of Berry Creek Falls, now far away and framed by trees like an image receding in a dream.

Comments

[Photo Criminal]

I just have to say I think your work is beautiful. Your photos take me into a different world. Damn good use of that wide lens too.