Posted November 10th, 2011, in: Ideas, Observations, Opinions, Rants Etc

In the late Eighties and early Nineties when my family lived in Modesto, CA, my best friend and I used to regularly ride our mountainbikes up and down Modesto’s McHenry Ave (the main drag of that town), and there used to be this giant tree, which I later learned is called a Monkey Puzzle Tree (Araucaria araucana).  It looked like Madusa.  And this was a very well manicured tree, having the approximate size and shape of an old Oak Tree.

I recently went on google street view and tried to find the tree, but it appears to have been removed.  Ugh!  One of the only good things about Modesto is gone.

I searched and searched online for any evidence that this tree once existed, and found nothing.  There’s no one talking about it.

I’m writing this so anyone else who is wondering about that tree might at least find this.  Yes, it was there.  No, I don’t have any pictures and as far as I know, there aren’t any anywhere online.

It may have been in the ‘McHenry Village’ shopping center (strip mall), but I’m not sure.

Please comment if you know where it was, or if you have anything else to say about it.

These trees can live to be a thousand or more years old.  They are considered ‘living fossils,’ since they have been around since dinosaur times.  They are only native to small regions of Latin America, and they are Chile’s ‘National Tree.’