The joy of walking through trees
A particular kind of joy comes with walking through a massive tree. Maybe it’s that moment of disbelief—you’re inside a tree!—or the simple awe of being dwarfed by something so impossibly old and enormous. Either way, I found myself thinking about that joy last spring when my family visited Redwood National and State Parks in California. My kids, ever-enthusiastic adventurers, insisted that we walk through every hollowed-out tree we could find. Every. Single. One. We even paid real money to drive through one.
Redwoods National and State Parks and Disney California Adventure's Redwood Creek Challenge Trail
While there, I was reminded of our trips to Disneyland and Disney California Adventure. At the latter, my family and I like to wander the Redwood Creek Challenge Trail. My kids love this spot, and honestly, so do I. There’s something oddly comforting about it—wandering under the canopy of trees, scrambling across suspension bridges, and, yes, walking through an enormous hollowed-out tree trunk. During my last visit, while walking through that carefully crafted, Disney-perfect forest, it hit me: once again Disney Imagineers brilliantly adapted something to suit their theming. In this case, I mean the large tree tunnel that you can walk through. Their original theming for Disney California Adventure was all about celebrating California; that has changed a lot. But in this case they paid homage to California history and its famous Redwoods.
So, why a tree tunnel? Why would Disney use something as specific as a cut-out tree trunk as one of the central experiences of this trail? Well, the hollow tree trunk is an iconic image that refers back to U.S. tourism's early days when road trips to national parks were a quintessential family adventure. By the mid-20th century, massive redwoods had become symbols of the American wilderness, and attractions like the Drive-Thru Tree in Leggett, California—where you could literally drive your car through a living redwood—were wildly popular.
Fun fact: The Chandelier Tree is one of the most popular trees to drive through in Leggett, and you can see it in National Lampoon's Vacation too in the opening credits.
Disney's nod to California Tree Tunnels
Disney’s version is a nod to this quirky piece of history, but it also taps into something more profound: the awe these ancient giants inspire. After all, the redwoods are some of the oldest living things on Earth. The coast redwoods (Sequoia sempervirens) can live for over 2,000 years, and some of the tallest trees in the world—towering over 350 feet—are found in Redwood National and State Parks. These forests have stood, more or less unchanged, since before the fall of the Roman Empire. Walking through them feels like stepping into a world where nature reigns supreme. It is pretty awesome and humbling, or at least that is how I feel when I am in their presence.
Tall trees and the "American Eden"
The majesty of these trees is so important to California history—and by extension the history of the United States and the Western U.S. in particular. Many of the most famous artists of the 19th century, such as Hudson River School artist Albert Bierstadt, tried to capture the beauty and awesomeness of these tall, ancient trees that became so associated with California. Their attempts to capture the Redwoods and California natural landscapes more generally is partly why Tunnel Trees would eventually become popular.
Painters and photographers, such as Bierstadt and Carleton Watkins, would regularly depict California landscapes, transforming them into icons of "prosperity, freedom, and influence," as one art historian described it. [1] Artists like them captivated audiences with their representations of Yosemite and the towering Redwoods. The latter was one way of creating an American antiquity—or a very ancient history—in the United States at a time when it was still creating its own "ancient history" that separated it from Europe. California was touted as an "American Eden."
(A separate post will have to focus on how they also conveniently omitted the Indigenous and Spanish settler populations from these artworks to suggest "unspoiled landscapes.")
Tree tunnels in California history
It wasn’t always guaranteed these forests would survive into the modern era. By the early 20th century, logging had devastated much of California’s ancient redwood forests. Conservation efforts began in earnest in 1918, when the Save the Redwoods League was founded to protect what remained of these awe-inspiring groves. Their efforts, along with establishing several state parks, ultimately led to the creation of Redwood National Park in 1968. Today, thanks to the combined efforts of the National Park Service and California State Parks, over 130,000 acres of redwood forest are protected, preserving this unique ecosystem for future generations.
The excitement about tree tunnels and people's ability to visit them helped to generate interest in protecting these ancient giants.
Redwood Creek Challenge Trail and Disney Magic
Back at Disney California Adventure, the Redwood Creek Challenge Trail is a much smaller, more controlled experience, but it evokes the spirit of that vast wilderness and its importance to California and U.S. history. The trail’s design—with its lookout towers, rope bridges, and hollowed-out tree trunk—mirrors visitors' sense of exploration and adventure in the real redwoods. And that’s what Disney does so well: they take familiar experiences and distill them into something playful and imaginative but still evocative of the real thing. It's what is often called Disney Magic.
Even how Disney has named places within the Redwood Creek Challenge Trail calls to mind the history(ies) I've been discussing. The hollowed-out tree is playfully named Big Sir. You can count tree rings in the Millennium Tree. Cross the bridge over Redwood Creek and you are on Wawona Walk—Wawona is a place known for its drive-through trees. On the other side of the trail, there is also a tree called Tunnel Tree—to spark associations with actual tunnel trees in California history AND because it is an actual tunnel sized for kids.
Fun fact: The Redwood Creek Challenge Trail also has a loose association with the Pixar movie Up, which happens to be one of my all-time favorite movies.
Imagination and awe: The magic of trees and Disney
Disney excels at creating spaces where something as simple as walking through a tree becomes a memorable moment, a magical moment. Sure, it’s not the same as standing in a centuries-old grove in the middle of Northern California, but it’s designed to evoke a similar emotional response—awe, wonder, and a little bit of magic sprinkled with pixie dust.
Here’s to both kinds of magic. To Disney for building places that can transport us far beyond where we are. And to the National Park Service for preserving the places that make us realize just how wild and wondrous the world is. One gives us a curated sense of awe; the other gives us the real thing. Both inspire us to slow down, look around, and—if my kids are in charge—find every possible tree tunnel to walk through.
Let's celebrate the joy of walking through trees, real and imagined.
Notes
[1] Eleanor James Harvey, Alexander Von Humboldt and the United States: Art, Nature, and Culture (Princeton University Press, 2020), 236.
CITE THIS PAGE: Kilroy-Ewbank, Dr. Lauren. "Walking Through Trees, Real and Imagined: Redwoods National and State Parks and Disney California Adventure." lkilroyewbank.com <Insert date you accessed> https://www.lkilroyewbank.com/post/redwoods-national-and-state-parks-and-disney-california-adventure.
Learn more!
Check out the National Park Service's information about Redwood Nation and State Parks
Read more about the Hudson River School, to which Albert Bierstadt belonged, on The Metropolitan Museum's Heilbrunn Timeline
Learn about early photographers of the American West during the 1960s–70s on The Metropolitan Museum's Heilbrunn Timeline
Want to learn more about Albert Bierstadt? I like Peter H. Hassrick, Albert Bierstadt: Witness to a Changing West, The Charles M. Russell Center Series on Art and Photography of the American West (University of Oklahoma Press, 2018).
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