Here is the tale…

 

Prologue…

It started with Bob Sundstrom scouting for the perfect tree to be the Gualala Festivals Committee’s Gift to the Community.  After trekking through miles of Zeni Ranch wilderness, he spots the perfect tree…bushy and perfectly shaped, and about 50’ tall!  He marks the tree and informs the committee of his find.

 

Early Sunday morning…members of the Committee head to the site to cut and bring back this monstrous beauty.  Problem is…it is so big and heavy, that in the attempt to get it on Billy Hay’s big rig lowboy, its weight breaks the ropes….twice!

 

So, to the rescue is SCVFD Chief Leighton Nelsen with his boom truck and crane to help the crew get it loaded…which they do…and the GFC caravan embarks on the slow journey back into town.

 

   

Meanwhile, back in town…Sid Waterman has previously had his crew manufacture a 10” diameter steel sleeve that has been imbedded in 3000 lbs. of concrete (from Bed Rock Products, Inc.)  poured into a hole (dug by John Bower) on the Gualala Community Center land where the tree will live for the season...but when the tree arrives…the trunk is too wide for the hole!

 

Undaunted, the GFC crew puts straps around the tree, Nelsen gently lifts the tree up with his crane, Hay fires up a chainsaw and proceeds to carefully and delicately carve away the outer bark on all sides so that the tree can slip into the buried sleeve.

 

 

 

 

As the last glow of sunset spreads over the landscape and darkness descends, the magnificent tree slips easily into the sleeve…is straightened to soar straight into the heavens and is shimmed into place. 

 

 

What collaboration…and what a wonderful gift to Gualala!

 

 

 

 

 

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