California-Oregon, Day 5

It was nice to stay in the park, the bathrooms did have showers.  We started on the main park road that would take use to the southern entrance where we would leave the park.  We stopped at the Devastated Area interpretive trail.  It last erupted in 1915...  We kept going and decided to hike to Bumpass Hell - one of the thermal areas in the park.  Instead of parking at the main lot - we took a backdoor hike there.  This paid off as we didn't see anyone on the way there.  The first lake was a "thermal" lake - cold boiling lake.  Rob claims he saw some bubbles.  I did not.

There were some ducks playing in it - so it must not have been that thermally active.

Up we went...  We didn't know anything about this trail - but as it was an in-and-out on the same trail - I started thinking I didn't want to have to go back down to get to Bumpass.

Well - the back door trail paid off.  It was beautiful.

Unique - we wondered a bit why the park service doesn't talk it up more...but that was okay, we liked the solitude.

Upon arriving at the main attraction - it was only a slight downhill  (thank goodness!).
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There were mostly mudpots and fumaroles in this hydrothermal basin...if you have been to Yellowstone, the thermal features are much more expansive.

It smelled of sulfur.

There were boardwalks to walk on...

Upon walking back, we noticed another hiker pass us when we stopped for a lunch break.  She had turned back around and was going to the main parking lot when we ran into her on the trail...we offered if she wanted to walk the back-door trail with us, we would take her back to her car at the main lot.  She took us up on the offer.

She was interesting...born in the US...moved to New Zealand...and was taking her holiday on the west coast.  She was headed to Lake Tahoe later that night, and was anxious to get there by dark.  She showed us her car where she could put down the seat, and sleep in the back...a nice alternative to camping and an interesting way to travel.  When we got to the Bumpass Hell parking lot, we were thankful we did the other trail for it was rather full and busy.  A very nice view.

This is my best picture of Mt. Lassen.  Not exactly and impressive volcanic mountain, but the namesake of the park.  We could have done the 2.5 mile, 2,000 foot hike to the top - but I just didn't want that sort of sun exposure on this very clear day at a higher altitude.

One more stop - one more hike.  Sulfur Works.  A boiling mudpot right of the road.  We saw 1.1 miles one way miles and figured we could handle that in an hour - but per the name of the hike "Ridge Lakes", we started upward for the ridge.

And up...and up...probably over 1,000 feet in that 1.1 miles.  The lake at the top was nice - but we were just not expecting that elevation gain.

I really liked Lassen Volcano National Park - I wasn't expecting much, and it ended up being one I would like to go back to.  It has snow much of the year, so the key is picking the right time to go.  We got back on the road by 4:00 pm and headed towards San Francisco.  I had to drag Rob back into the car after checking into the small motel in San Rafael (which had a really good price for the San Francisco area).  But, when you are only 10/15 minutes away from the Golden Gate Bridge - why not go see it at night!