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"We are often told that the world is going from bad to worse, sacrificing everything to mammon. But this righteous uprising in defense of God's trees in the midst of exciting politics and wars is a telling story, and every sequoia, I fancy, has heard the good news and is waving its branches for joy."

From an unpublished manuscript by John Muir, written when the Save-the-Redwoods League was beginning its work (most likely in the early 1900's), as quoted in SOUTH OF YOSEMITE: Selected Writings of John Muir.

This month's photos are from a vacation trip my wife and I took this summer in northern California. One of our stops was Muir Woods, with its well-known redwoods. When you're surrounded by these towering trees, it's hard to avoid spending hours with your neck bent back to follow the tall trunks as they reach into the sky. This image is meant to convey some of the sense of the enormity and sheer height of these beautiful trees.

"If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water ... Once in a lifetime, perhaps, one escapes the actual confines of the flesh. Once in a lifetime, if one is lucky, one so merges with sunlight and air and running water that whole eons, the eons that mountains and deserts know, might pass in a single afternoon without discomfort."

From "The Flow of the River" by Loren Eiseley, in THE IMMENSE JOURNEY.

We hiked away from the main visiting areas of Muir Woods to get to some of the more secluded sections, including this waterfall. It was late morning by the time we arrived there, but the dense canopy of redwood branches kept most of the sunlight out except for a few shafts of light that shone down on the water.