RESURRECT DEAD ON PLANET JUPiTER

Fascinating Seclusion

I really recommend taking a week off. None of this computer shit. No newspapers or television. And most importantly, don’t go to work. I recommend taking 2 weeks, or if you can swing it a month or a year. Or if you’re like my host last month, you can move 11 miles down a winding and dangerous canyon lined dirt road in a largely inaccessible and sparsely populated corner of northern California and stay there for 38 years.

That’s what Charles and Vanna Rae Bello did when they abandoned greater society back in 1968. But the Bello’s aren’t your usual brand of eccentric backwoods recluses. The first thing that distinguishes them is their cause: a 2000-year plan to restore California’s giant Redwoods. Charles and Vanna Rae, under authority of their non-profit, the Redwood Forest Institute have bought and protected more than 400 acres Redwood covered land. Many of ‘their’ trees have been assigned an odd legal status, belonging to no individual and illegal for anyone to cut, ever. So long as the law maintains its legitimacy under whatever legal system passes through northern California over the next couple of millennia, many these trees will grow into giants.

The other thing that sets the Bello’s apart is their enormous wealth of building, gardening, electrical, architectural, mechanical, engineering and farming skill and experience. Charles Bello, a man in his mid-70’s with the body and mind of a 40 year old athlete and the work ethic of a team of sled dogs, designed and built the 3 beautiful, solar powered homes that sit on the ranch. He maintains his section of roads and bridges himself. His tool shed is the size of a small airplane hangar.

In his garage, Charles proudly showed us his backhoe. It sat next to the 10-ton truck that he bought (and rebuilt into working condition) to haul the concrete slabs he made for the new bridge he was building. When someone commented on the amount of money all of it must have cost, he shrugged it off with a dismissive and almost embarrassed “O yeah” before continuing on his regularly scheduled tour.

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Sitting at the bottom of a dangerous, 11-mile long, private, gravel road, which follows (without barriers) the rim of a large canyon, the ranch is about as secluded as California can get. Here is a little of what it looks like:

Charles Bello also worked with wood sculpture. Some pieces were carefully carved, while others were just placed suggestively.

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A Ford Galaxie powered sawmill:

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The Bello’s Glass house:

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A view from the porch of our rented cabin.

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Charles’s workshop:

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Our cabin had a bat. Before we chased it out, I managed to get this shot. Then everyone made me put away my camera and we chased it out.

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From one of the bridges:

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And the bridge itself:

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Do you see those tiny orange specks in the photo above this one. Here they are:

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And of course there were the Redwoods:

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No trip to a Redwood forest would be complete without this shot: