The redwoods, once seen, leave a mark or create a vision that stays with you always. No one has ever successfully painted or photographed a redwood tree. The feeling they produce is not transferable. From them comes silence and awe. It's not only their unbelievable stature, nor the color which seems to shift and vary under your eyes, no, they are not like any trees we know, they are ambassadors from another time. The vainest, most slap-happy and irreverent of men, in the presence of redwoods, goes under a spell of wonder and respect. Respect - that's the word. One feels the need to bow to unquestioned sovereigns.

-John Steinbeck
Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Photo from a trip to the Muir Woods near San Fran, CA over Thanksgiving and text from a book filled with wisdom I happened to be reading at the time. A book I will be quoting often in coming posts I feel.