Almost 10 years ago, I rafted in to Cooper’s Island with a crew to set up a bald eagle camera in a massive pine tree. That’s a story for another day, but I’ll never forget what I found walking around the island: the ancient ruins of a treehouse at least 30 feet up an oak tree. As a treehouse connoisseur and builder, I was blown away. It was falling apart at the edges, but it was clearly a well-built structure before time’s ravages. Who built it out on this public island? How did they get all the materials here? How many people helped? And how did they build it that high in the tree? Certainly no ladder could reach up there. How did they access it? Had a makeshift ladder attached to the tree rotted away? Did they employ some system of ropes or pulleys to get hum and up and down.
I encourage you to go find the Cooper’s Island treehouse ruins and marvel like I did all those years ago.