South Carolina’s Angel Oak was not named after anything spiritual, but rather the last name of former property owners. The southern live oak is estimated to be 400 years old and despite taking on a material surname, there are legends of ghosts and angels appearing in its branches. Maybe those stories are why the name stuck. Regardless of its name or age, the tree feels like a rift between two worlds; the material and the enchanted.
In the material world, the Angel Oak has an impressive height, but the twenty-five foot width of its trunk and the volume of its branches are what make it unique. Its branches are large enough to be trees on their own, and the greenery now growing in its canopy provides an entire ecosystem above the ground. Visiting the tree is free, but you must go during daylight hours and park your car somewhere along the dirt road that skirts the edge of the longest reaching branches. You don’t even need to get out of the car.
All of these statistics are interesting, to a point, but they carry little meaning. There is something else at work here. Something enchanting. The Angel Oak is from another realm.
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