Muir Woods

I took my younger daughter on a trip to San Francisco during her spring break one year. One of the many places we visited was the incredible park called Muir Woods. It may be simply a walk in the woods, but this is no ordinary woods.

Muir Woods National Monument is part of the greater Golden Gate recreational area. The woods are named after John Muir, a naturalist from Scotland, who was an advocate of preserving areas such as this.

The appeal of the park are the massive redwoods that reside within it. These trees are incredibly impressive, not only due to their size, but by their appearance. Even though there are many other people walking through this monument, at the same time, it still seemed incredibly peaceful.

The park has an interesting history. By the 20th century most of the redwood trees had been wiped out by loggers. A man named William Kent noticed that this inaccessible piece of land still held many of these now rare redwood. He bought the land for $45,000 and was going to keep it as a preservation.

Later, the water company wanted to damn the redwood Creek. This would've flooded this region and wiped out these incredible trees. Of course, William Kent fought them, but they had eminent domain in their favor. So, in a clever move, he donated the land to the national government.

The area was designated as a national monument in 1908. You may be curious why this isn't a national park. That's because national parks were not yet in existence in 1908, and it has kept its designation as a national monument ever since.

Many thanks to William Kent and his incredible generosity. I'll share with you now the pictures of the trip that my daughter and I made through this incredible forest.

These trees are amazingly resilient. They have endured forest fires over the years. They are very difficult to burn down.

This park is located across the bridge from San Francisco just north of the city. We actually took a tour bus that day, before the days that I actually begin to dislike these types of tours. But this one was very enjoyable.

I hope you enjoyed this visual presentation of Murwood