What is the oldest tree in Sequoia National Park?
General Sherman is the giant sequoia at the centre of the Giant Forest in Sequoia National Park, most often dated at 2,300 to 2,700 years, with older estimates running as high as 3,200. It is the largest living single-stem tree on Earth by volume rather than the oldest: other sequoias in the same grove may well be older, and none has been cored to settle it. It is a half-mile walk from the Sherman Tree parking lot, downhill on the way in.
Sequoia National Park is large, and General Sherman is the reason most first-time visitors drive into this part of it. The tree stands in the Giant Forest, on the Main Trail, about half a mile from the Sherman Tree parking lot. The walk in is downhill and partly paved, which makes the walk out the uphill one. A seasonal shuttle runs for anyone who would rather not do it twice. The park charges an entrance fee at the gate. Once you are through, the tree costs nothing. There is no public transport into the park, and the nearest town is Three Rivers, about 45 minutes' drive from the entrance. The thing worth knowing before you arrive is that the fame is about bulk, not height. At 83.6 metres it is an ordinary tall sequoia. At about 31 metres round the base it is not, and the roughly 1,487 cubic metres of trunk is what makes it the largest living single-stem tree on the planet.
See more themed collections of remarkable trees.