It was nearly 8 years ago that I last visited the Big Trees in Calaveras County.  Back in March 2009 when I drove with the Big Guy up into the mountains to spend some time , there was a fair bit of snow on the ground among the giant redwoods.  It’s a beautiful place that we both remembered from childhood visits.

At that time, the weather was windy and cold; we were the only two people in the park stomping through the snow and pausing now and then to listen to the peaceful solitude.  I later blogged about it  (here and here) and shared some of the pictures I took — although sadly, I downloaded only a couple of the image files to Flickr, and now I can’t seem to find the originals anywhere.

This morning, I was very sad to read in the news that the Pioneer Cabin Tree fell during our weekend storm and apparently shattered into pieces when it hit the ground.  No one knows precisely how old or how tall the tree was, but it was already a very large tree in the 1880s, when somebody decided it would be a great idea to cut a tunnel through the trunk.  It’s been a familiar and well loved part of Calaveras Big Trees State Park for so long, it’s hard to imagine it won’t still be standing there the next time we go back.

Here’s to the memory of one of California’s most iconic redwoods, and let’s pray that 100 years from now the giant redwoods are still standing proud.