Memories of Big Basin

When we first moved to California and our daughter was younger, we used to do a lot of camping in the summer. It was fun, inexpensive, and a way to take advantage of the great weather in the Bay Area (and when it got too hot in Silicon Valley, it was often a fair bit cooler in the mountains under the trees).

One of our favorite spots to camp was Big Basin, California’s oldest state park. It was just isolated enough to avoid it being overrun with people (you had to navigate a seriously twisty little road to get there), while remaining close enough to make it a good destination for a weekend camping trip. And with its coastal redwoods it was a different world from the valley’s more Mediterranean climate.

Unfortunately, Big Basin was hit by CZU complex fire that’s still burning, destroying the historic headquarters building and damaging much of the park’s infrastructure. According to the latest reports, it sounds like it’s going to be closed for at least a year for repairs.

Thankfully, it also sounds like most of the redwoods survived (they’re extremely hardy, and fire actually helps them reproduce (so long as the fire isn’t too intense). So future families will be able to also build memories of summer vacations together in the woods.