Moision Madness

After our fantastic day in Redding and Shasta, we finally arrived in Lassen in the late afternoon. Once we found our campsite at the Summit Lake South campground, we pretty much had time to set up camp …

Build a fire …

And make a quick dinner (the boys’ favorite camping meal: hot dogs).

Of course there was marshmallow roasting later and some relaxation time. We’d treated our clothes with some mosquito repellant so we were actually able to sit outside without getting bitten to pieces. (We’d heard that the mosquitos were horrible, but we actually came away with only a couple of bites.)

The next morning after breakfast, we dragged the boys away from their whittling …

… and took a walk by the lake. The landscape is stunning so I’m just going to post a bunch of photos here.

After our walk, we packed up some lunch and drove to Manzanita Lake where we rented kayaks and paddled around the lake.

It was a beautiful day.

After the kayaking, Bruce and Finn tried paddle boarding.

Ezra just wanted to walk around in the water. Can’t hardly blame him.

They did all take a swim a little later at another area of the lake.

Next we went to the Loomis Museum and the boys did part of their Junior Ranger activity. We then hiked the short Lily Pond Trail and stopped for lunch.

On the drive back to our campsite, we stopped at Hot Rock which is a 30-ton chunk of rock that was swept from Lassen Peak to its current location in the 1915 eruptions.

Climbing ensued, of course.

Next we went to the Devastated Area which had a short hike with lots of stops explaining the 1915 eruptions with before and after photos.

Of course, nature is rebounding in this area, but it is still a shadow of the mature forest that was destroyed in 1915.

The stop along the trail explaining “puzzled rocks” was of particular interest to the boys.

Back at the campsite, we had a little time to relax (with more whittling).

And then the boys went swimming at the lake. (I, like an idiot, had decided not to bring a swim suit because we thought the water would be too cold. I won’t make that mistake again.) While they were gone I read my book and watched this curious squirrel look for food we might have left behind.

Later there were the usual evening activities.

We called it pretty early as we were all tired from the day’s activities.

The next morning Finn did some reading.

Ezra did some playing in the muddy water.

And then we packed up for our big activity of the day, hiking the Bumpass Hell trail. It was a perfect hike for us — a little over 2.5 miles, mostly easy terrain although occasionally challenging, with spectacular views. There was still snow on the ground, and, in fact, the trail had only been opened for the season a few days before we arrived. Good timing as it was definitely a highlight of our trip.

The payoff of “all the walking” (as the boys would say) is the Bumpass Hell area which is chock full of fumaroles and mudpots, reminding us there is all sorts of stuff going on under the surface of the earth that we normally can’t see. It was fascinating, and easily accessible with boardwalks (and lots of warnings to stay on the boardwalks or risk burn injuries!).

Here’s a five-second video of one of the boiling mudpots.

And here’s another ten-second video.

After we’d explored the boardwalk areas, we went to the lookout point above. Google Photos stitched together my individual pictures to make this panorama of the whole thing.

Finally, we headed back out.

We’d arrived pretty early and mostly had the trail to ourselves, but as we were leaving it was quite crowded so we were happy we’d gotten an early start.

After the hike, we took a break in the parking lot for snacks and more work on the Junior Ranger activities.

On the way to Kohm Yah-mah-nee Visitor Center, we stopped at Sulfur Works to see (and smell, ack!) some big sulfur pots. It was super interesting, although a little unpleasant when a big poof of sulfury steam gets right up your nose.

I made the boys pose for a picture.

I don’t have any pictures from the visitor center but we had a great time there. It’s very well done, with good activities for the kids and a beautiful setting. The boys really did a lot of work for their Junior Ranger badges this time. Here they are being “sworn in.”

They got cool badges with the notation that it’s the National Park centennial this year.

On the way back north to our campsite, we stopped at Emerald Lake at my request. The lakes just looked so inviting and I had to stick my feet in. Finn was too worn out so he waited in the car, but Ezra was game.

That evening we went to a ranger-led activity at our campground, which was a very interesting presentation about all sorts of living things that have behind-the-scenes functions in the forest that are vital to its survival. The ranger did a great job involving all the kids in the audience and it was a fun presentation. I didn’t take any photos during the presentation, but here are a few from our walk over to the amphitheater.

The next morning we had avocado toast for breakfast …

… and then packed up our site and headed for home. A year ago I’d never heard of Lassen, but it was so spectacular I would highly recommend it for anyone looking to visit one of our National Parks.

Our second and final camping trip of the summer was to Lassen Volcanic National Park. However, since it’s about a 4-5 hour drive northeast of us we decided to drive up the day before the camping started and stay overnight in Redding. We had a surprisingly good time on this initial stop! We arrived in the late afternoon and, after grabbing what we needed from the van, we took a little walk around.

Mostly the kids just wanted to try out Pokemon Go, but Bruce’s phone was dying and the phone the kids use needs wifi, so that didn’t last very long.

We had dinner at a Mexican place near our hotel and walked around a little more after dinner before crashing. As an aside, I love this shot of all of our bikes crowding up the hotel room. I’m paranoid about them being stolen from the bike rack, so we brought them in.

After breakfast at the hotel the next morning we took off on a bike ride on the Sacramento River Trail. It was a lovely ride, mostly flat but with a few hills to make sure we were paying attention. Here are some shots from along the way.

The boys really liked the ribbon bridge and we rode across it several times.

Sadly, we had some technical difficulties on the way back. My left pedal fell off and because the crank was stripped inside it wouldn’t go back on. Thankfully Bruce managed to MacGyver his pedal on my bike (they attach differently) and my pedal went on his bike.

So, feeling a little uneven, we managed to make it back to the hotel.

After getting cleaned up and packed, we checked out of the hotel, but we weren’t ready to leave Redding just yet. We headed over to the Turtle Bay Exploration Park, which we’d read good things about. It didn’t disappoint. First stop was the Sundial Bridge, which is super cool and very hard to photograph!

This is my best outcome from many attempts to get it all in one picture.

And it was perfectly accurate!

We explored the inside of the museum too — good thing because it was about a million degrees outside. Lots of cool science and music stuff.

When we were done inside we made one last stop outside at the Parrot Playhouse to see the lorikeets. Ezra loved this part.

Bruce, too.

Here’s a short video of a couple of the birds fighting for Bruce’s offering.

After Redding our initial plan had been to go straight to Lassen, but we decided on one more detour — to Shasta Dam. I’m glad we changed the plan because it was quite impressive.

Lake Shasta with Mount Shasta in the background:

We missed the tour but did spend some time in the visitors center which included footage from Huell Howser’s show about it. Very interesting, but still incredibly hot outside, so we were happy to get back into the air conditioned van and drive to our final destination.

In our efforts to explore north of us, we scheduled two camping trips this summer. The first one — to Mt. Tamalpais State Park near Marin — was at the end of June. We stayed at the Steep Ravine campground, a small area with limited amenities but gorgeous views. First, though, a little bit about our drive up. We crossed the Golden Gate Bridge while it was half covered in fog, an iconic view that I made Bruce take a picture of (since I was driving). He loves it when I make him take pictures.

We stopped for lunch and a walk around Marin before heading west to the campground.

The campground is on the cliffs overlooking the ocean (awesome!)…

… but you have to park in the lot and haul all your stuff to your site via wheel barrows (not so awesome!).

The boys were thrilled.

We took a quick exploratory walk. This view was ten steps from our campsite.

After we were settled in, we hit the beach.

Here’s our destination.

And the way to get to it … not easy!

But it was definitely worth the hassle of climbing over the rocks. A beautiful, quiet, sunny beach is my happy place.

The boys love it too.

They flew kites.

And dug holes.

And got surprise-attacked by cold waves.

After a while we headed back up to the campsite for dry clothes and food; then we did a little more exploring.

Back at the site, there was whittling.

And tree-climbing.

And deer-sighting.

And an early campfire — it was colder than we’d expected.

After the boys’ favorite camping dinner (hotdogs) we turned in early because we were all freezing and just wanted to get in our sleeping bags.

The night included a raccoon invasion that Finn and I slept through. Bruce and Ezra woke up, though, and knew those pesky pests were going after our food so they got up to fight them off. The rascals couldn’t get into our cooler or food container, thankfully, but we must have left a loaf of bread out although neither of us remembers getting it out of the box. They ripped it apart.

It was clear from the box that they had made a valiant effort to open that too.

A little while later when the boys and I were snuggled up in the tent (it was still so cold!) and I had dozed off, Bruce starting yelling at us to get up because there was a whale close by. Despite being startled awake, which is not my favorite thing, I was happy to have the opportunity to see the whale. It was amazing — he stayed out there for a long time feeding. I tried to get a good shot, but you can’t tell where he’s going to come up until he’s already up and my reflexes aren’t that fast. But here are a couple of shots.

Once we’d had enough of whale watching, we took a hike around the campground as the fog started to lift.

As soon as the sun was fully out, we headed back down to the beach for several hours.

Finally, after the boys were soaked and every morsel of food had been eaten, we trekked back up to the campsite for chips and salsa. And dry clothes.

And views! I couldn’t stop taking pictures.

In the evening, we had another campfire, burritos for dinner, and, of course, roasted marshmallows. We were all pretty tired, though, and turned in early again. Did I mention that the tent was on an incline? Not the best sleeping situation, but we didn’t have another choice. It was comical how much the boys slid down during the night … right off their pillows.

The raccoons came back for a second try, as evidenced by the paw prints all over the cooler, but we’d thwarted their attempts and they got nothing! Nothing! We, however, had a lovely breakfast of avocado toast.

As usual, after a couple of nights of camping we were ready to get home (or maybe that’s just me). So we packed everything up pretty quickly and hit the road. Or … maybe not. We were pulling out of the campground when Bruce noticed a trailhead across the road. So, we parked the car and, much to the boys’ dismay, started walking on the Steep Ravine Trail.

Pretty soon the boys came around and we all had a nice time on the hike.

It was a great way to end our first trip of the summer.