Big Basin continues its recovery from the heavy rainfall that pounded the area the first three weeks of the year with the highway running through the park reopening to through traffic the day before our Feb. 11th workday and the park now scheduled to reopen to the public on Feb. 21st though only the Redwood Loop Trail (RWL) will initially be accessible.
With a crew of 21 for the Feb. 11th workday and the RWL ready for the park's reopening, we moved on to other trails and split into three crews to expedite the work. The first crew picked up where we left off the last time by working the Skyline-to-Sea (STS) between the Old Lodge and Gazos Creek Fire Rd. The debris was gathered and put into existing burn piles and the crew cleared the trail to Gazos Creek Fire Road.
A second crew hiked ahead to start work on lower Dool Trail and the third crew hiked through to upper Dool, which had reports of the heaviest storm debris. Most of the work was small debris that littered the trails and only needed to be added to existing burn piles.
The heavier upper Dool work was just above Gazos Creek where a burned redwood had toppled and scattered lots of debris, limbs and smaller trees, across the trail. It required a little chainsaw work to cut the bigger sections and then lots of hands to move everything to burn piles. Some of the debris went into existing burn piles while the rest was used to build a new burn pile from scratch.
All three crews met at the top of upper Dool for lunch just as a light rain started for the first time all day.
After lunch we hiked Middle Ridge Fire Rd over to lower Sunset where we found the same small debris and a new footbridge constructed by the State Crew.
The crew put in 154 hours ans thanks to Daryn Bieri, Jim Brooks, Rory Brooks, Nan Bowman, Julie Charles, John Collins, Dale Elliott, Michele Gelblum, Peter Gelblum, Tommy Ha, Charles Jalgunas, Andrea Lee, Janie Leifhelm, John Martin, Janette Mello, Mike Peasland, Dale Petersen, Devdutt Sheth, Bruce Washburn, Chris Young and newcomer Diane Shaw, for their help in preparing the park for additional opening.
BURN INTENSITY MAP OF 2020 CUZ FIRES
Almost all of Big Basin experienced some degree of damage from the 2020 CZU fires, the burn intensity map provides another perspective on what areas burned hotter and why the headquarters area may have in some way been lucky even with the loss of the all the historic structures.
The bright red areas on the map burned the hottest during the fire, so with multiple lightening strikes on top of the Waddell bluffs on the ocean side of Big Basin you can see the intense burning on the ridges above the Rancho del Oso canyon as the fire moved towards Berry Creek Falls. But in other areas of the park there is a mosaic of lighter pink indicating more modest fire conditions and even some green, unburned, areas.
In the HQ area, the map shows lighter pink shades and even some green areas, with the Sunset Trail section we recently worked a slightly darker shade of red. Working with the map a little provides a chance to combine our first hand knowlege of areas we've worked already with actual fire intensity and leaves you wondering what the Berry Creek Falls area must look like. With all the damage to the named trees on the Redwood Loop Trail from the more moderate fire in that area, it makes you ponder if the Mother of the Forest, Father of the Forest, and other trees could have survived the greater fire intensity the park saw further west.