AllTrails showed a hike, ride, or drive out to a Giant Sequoia tree near where we are camping in Southern Utah so we routed a ride to see it. The rough dirt forest service road leaves from the interstate at Browse, Utah. We parked just off the highway and hopped on our mountain bikes to explore.
The dirt road wasn’t as bad as I though it would be, just washboard in some places and narrow and rugged in others. The lower slopes of the climb have oak brush galore followed by red sandstone outcroppings and then white sandstone megacliffs. There are stunning views of Zion’s West Temple, and countless mountains and formations everywhere. It’s basically a climb the whole way out though there are a couple descents down to stream crossings before you have to climb back out the other side. The road gets very rough after the turnoff for Wet Sandy Trail and high clearance vehicles are necessary if you’re driving.
Our turnaround point…the Giant Sequoia. This towering non-native tree has been a fixture in the area since the Great Depression. The Pine Valley Giant Sequoia is located approximately one hundred feet behind the abandoned Browse Guard Station. According to the Washington County Historical Society website, it is approximately 108-140 feet tall and 11.25 feet in circumference. In 1933, the Forest Service built a road to start what became known as the “Browse” plant study to determine what plants browsing animals would eat, complete with control plots. The Civilian Conservation Corps built a guard station and outhouse in 1934 and the cabin became a woodshed and store room.
This tree is not native to this area. It was planted as a sapling in 1933-34 by Dr. Walter P. Cottam as part of the Browse Experiment Station. Around 15 were planted in the Pine Valley area but the only one known to have survived was near the cabin in the Browse area of the mountain. We made the short walk past the guard station to admire the big beauty, eat our sandwiches, and then ride back down. It’s a screaming descent back, not necessarily steep, just a long downhill. Woohoo!
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