Family Adventure to Lassen

By Liz -
Although we always have lots of adventures, this was our first family vacation that was just the three of us. I'd seen an article in Via about the very cool (well technically they are HOT) geologic features at Lassen Volcanic National Park and told Steve I wanted to go, so we planned a trip to help celebrate our 5 year anniversary at the end of July.  We rented a cute little cabin close to the Northwest Park entrance that was right on a rushing stream (and included a rather perilous car bridge to cross).  So here is picture overload of how we spent our two days in the park--

Our first day we entered the park and got ourselves oriented at the Visitor's center. We took a short hike, out and back, before picnicking at the lake. There was a family of ducklings that came so close--Lorelei was enchanted! Then we splashed in the lake, throwing pine cones and kicking our feet.




On our second day we got up a little earlier and drove through the park towards some of the famous geologic features.  The trail to Bumpass Hell (the guy who first found it had the last name of Bumpass. Seriously, what are the odds?) is at almost 8,000 feet-- so even though it was late July, there was still plenty of snow.  The hike is fairly flat, but the snow made it slippery in places. Lorelei did really well in the pack despite a few slips. (We did fashion a bink clip so that she could have her bink without fear of losing it).  When we made it to Bumpass Hell we smelled the sulphur, saw huge fumeroles, boiling mud pots, and all sorts of strange, beautiful features created by this geologic hot spot.

We could easily have spent more time in the park, but it was time to go. On our day to travel home, we decided to drive up the road to Redding and visit the Turtle Bay Exploration Park. Lorelei sat on the turtle sculpture (created by our friend Troy Corliss), helped feed the lorikeets, watched the native fish in the freshwater aquarium and took a walk across the Sundial Bridge. She then slept all the way home. :) 


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