Last week my husband and I spent a lovely five days on the coast, about an hour from our home on the San Francisco Peninsula, exploring and  hiking everyday, and for me, drawing. One of our most memorable outings was to Butano State Park, just south of Pescadero. I hadn't realized how badly burned it was by the 2020 CZU Lightning Fire Complex. The same fire that devastated Big Basin Redwoods State Park, whose boundary is not far from Butano, and killed many trees and burned park structures to the ground.  It was the type of fire that created its own weather, which was frightening to witness. I remember seeing a bizarre wave-cloud of smoke above the mountains then, that reminded me of tornado wave-clouds.

But Butano State Park was lucky this time- the fires didn't burn as hot here, and it didn't burn the bigger redwoods all the way up to the canopy, and many had green foliage.  But I saw lots of younger redwoods that were surely dead, because a year later there's no signs of green growth.

It was shocking to witness what climate change has delivered to these precious wild places where these ancient trees would normally survive multiple centuries, and even reach over a thousand or two years of age. But I was also struck by the stark beauty of what fire had made, and I'm hoping to go spend some time there to draw, and process what is happening to our beloved forests.

It's clear that disasters driven by climate change are part of our realities now, wherever we live. The choices we make every single day will determine our futures and that of our children and grandchildren.