While I had not visited Redwoods NP since I was a small kid, Lassen Volcanic NP is the last of California's 9 national parks I had yet to visit so I was looking forward to getting a taste of what it had on offer. And hey, geology. I was excited to see some of the volcanic peaks, landslide deposits, geothermal areas, and if weather cooperated, to hike up Lassen Peak, site of California's most recent volcanic eruption in 1915. For the couple months leading up to our visit the enormous Park Fire was lapping at the national park's southern boundary forcing a park closure that lasted until a couple weeks before.
We had a rough unplanned start to the day with a 4am wakeup and drive, then spent almost 2 hours trying to catch up on sleep at a rest stop. Eventually around midday we checked out Subway Cave near Old Station just outside the park. This turned out to be a rather neat 0.3 mile-long spacious lava tube cave with a nice pahoehoe floor, perfect tube shape, and remarkably little breakdown for an easy stroll.
After the Subway Cave detour we entered Lassen Volcanic NP's north entrance and immediately a light rain kicked in. It was cheap and disappointing to find out the park no longer issues the classic signature black line folded souvenir maps and instead got a printout of what amounted to their lousy app. The weather was cold and breezy with an on/off light rain so we suspected we would not be doing a lot of longer hikes and instead focused on the drive and roadside stops. The plus side was highly dynamic weather with interesting clouds for photography. Chaos and destruction seemed to be the theme as we traversed the northern part of the park. First we drove through the vast Chaos Jumbles, the lightly forested rocky piles of a 340 year old rock avalanche deposit. Then we did a short loop walk through some of the deposits and rocks from the 1915 eruption in the "Devastated Area". Then we drove through dead standing forests from a slew of fires over the last decade.
We had a few more quick roadside stops including shimmering waters of Summit Lake, Upper Meadow (spotting a cute little tree frog), and the Lassen Peak trailhead. The air was brisk and the summit shrouded in clouds so enthusiasm was low to hike it for the sake of hiking it without the views. Onward we went to the trailhead for Bumpass Hell, the park's most prominent geothermal area and the hike I most hoped to get in now that the summit was unappealing.
It was sufficiently cool that I actually pulled on a beanie and a rainshell. The 1.5 mile long trail was actually quite nice with a few brief moments of clearing clouds revealing the summit of Lassen and some nice views over some of the lesser volcanic peaks (Mount Diller, Brokeoff Mountain, etc.) that together made the remnants of the monstrous Mount Tehama caldera eruption.
Bumpass Hell did not disappoint with colorful badlands of altered rocks, blue-green spring pools, boiling pots, shifting steam clouds, and an ominous jet engine hiss emerging from one of the fumeroles. With the shifting clouds above, the light continually changed, providing dynamic viewing that would have made for an excellent timelapse. We walked the trail down through the hanging basin on boardwalks and then out to the viewpoint at the other side before returning the way we had come. It wasn't Yellowstone or Iceland, but apparently it is the most extensive hydrothermal area anywhere in the Cascades.
Our last stop was the roadside Sulphur Works for more boiling mud, fumeroles, and interesting sulfur crystals, then continued our drive towards the park's south entrance.
We missed the park visitor center open hours by about five minutes, which was frustrating. We knew there was more to see, but with the forecast for a very cold night and more unsettled weather the following day we thought it best to be happy with our dynamic day trip through the park and to head onward for home. We had dinner in Chico then attempted to put some of the Central Valley driving behind us, before finishing off the drive the next day.
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