I arrived at Lassen Volcanic National Park on a cold, blustery, rainy afternoon. The Visitor Center, usually a warm and welcoming place was closed. Clouds and fog obscured any long-range views. I stopped at the “Sulphur Factory,” a place stinking of sulfur-containing gases with bubbling pots of mud:

I felt as if I had arrived in an infernal region, an impression reinforced by the multitude of burned, and sometimes twisted, trees.

Many of these trees were burned in the Dixie Fire of 2021—the largest wildfire in park history

I drove north through the “scenic” drive that was entirely obscured by the rainy clouds. As the altitude passed 8,500 ft, the rain turned into snow.

Traversing a bumpy dirt road, I finally arrived at Butte Lake, the site of my campground for the night, a lake bordering a heap of lava:

Then followed the frustrating challenge of setting up my Starlink antenna in the presence of trees limiting the view of most of the sky.

Cinder Cone Mountain

I awoke to a cold and grey morning and decided to take the Cinder Cone Mountain trail. The trail led along the edge of a great mass of basalt lava, called the Fantastic Lava Beds:  

The soil was composed of black weathered crushed cinder blocks from the Cinder Cone Mountain, which finally came into sight:

I came to the base of the mountain where a trail leads to the top.

The path leads along gravelly, sandy cinder debris with the angle of the slope close to the “angle of repose” of 30 to 35 degrees. There is said to be a good view from the top, but the weather was still cloudy and foggy so I decided that this was a path not to be taken, at least by me.

On the way back along the Fantastic Lava Beds, the weather started to brighten and I began to focus on how life was present even at the edges, lichen yielding to grass and small trees eventually leading to a fully developed forest.

A beautiful forest sheltering abundant animal life:

Mt Lassen

As I drove back to the northern end of the scenic drive (Highway 89), the sun and blue skies started to emerge, making everything brighter and more cheerful looking. My next stop was at a place called the Devasted Area with a fine view of Mt Lassen, about three miles away:

The source of the devastation was a massive eruption of Mt Lassen on May 22, 1915, but the area has been fully recolonized by life and is now a pleasant forest. The most prominent remnants of the devastation are the large volcanic boulders scattered throughout the forest such as this chunk of lava, which cracked as it cooled:

Another massive boulder was already formed before it was violently thrown over a distance of more than three miles:

Note the 20-oz bottle on top of the boulder indicating the scale. One can only wonder at the force needed to throw this rock so far.

Driving around the base of Mt Lassen to my next destination, I was briefly captivated by lovely Lake Helen:

Bumpass Hell Trail

The popular Bumpass Hell Trail leads to the largest active hydrothermal in the park, named after the discoverer, Kendall Vanhook Bumpass, an explorer active in the 1860s. Unfortunately, as part of the discovery, he broke through the surface of a scalding hot mud pot and consequently lost a leg by amputation.

The path to the largest hydrothermal sin the park is exceptionally scenic:

And the hydrothermal region does not disappoint:

The largest steam vent is the Big Boiler, which is very noisy and can be heard from a long distance:

Getting close to the hydrothermal area reveals the fascinating presence of life in this unpromising environment, such as green spots in the effluent indicating the presence of extremophiles:

A sulfuric acid pool is the byproduct of the activities of other extremophiles:

Here is a pool generating glittering iron pyrites (“Fool’s Gold”) created from the sulfur and the iron leached from the rocks:

And a bubbling sulfurous mud pot:

After this remarkable trail, it was time to leave the wonders of the park.

After a short break in the San Francisco Bay area, I will be traveling to the Pinnacles National Park.