6/20: Near Burney, CA: Lassen Volcanic National Park's Chaos Crags and Jumbles!

After being drawn to the massive, whimsical animal figures made from spare parts in a junkyard in Cassel in northeastern California, we drove 35 miles south to Lassen Volcanic National Park, the reason we'd come to this area. The park lies at the crossroads of the Cascade Range to the north, the Sierra Nevada Mountains to the south and the Great Basin desert that we'd driven through from eastern Nevada. We had certainly timed our visit just right as, the weekend before, it had been the first national park in the state to fully open back up during the coronavirus. That was quite a feat when you consider the 30-mile-long highway through the park is normally impassable due to snow from late October to mid-June. No wonder, then, there was a 15-minute wait to enter the park that had one of the largest plug dome volcanoes, Lassen Peak, in the world!

For a period of many thousands of years, 10,457-foot high Lassen Peak had been quiet but there were many eruptions between 1914 and 1921, with the largest being in May of 1915. Hot Rock derived its name that year when local businessman and photographer B.F. Loomis reported it was too hot to touch after it had just been ejected from the crater of Lassen Peak. There were quite a few other rocks in the immediate vicinity that presumably were ejected at the same time.

A plaque further on marked the route early pioneers took in 1852 over Noble Pass which linked the Humboldt-Nevada Road with the town of Shasta in northern California. During the 1850s and 1860s, several thousand emigrants used the Nobles' Emigrant Trail in their migration from the eastern United States. Although the wagon tacks had long faded, it was inspiring knowing we were standing on one of several emigrant trails that led settlers and gold miners to California. Especially after the discovery of gold in 1848, the push to reach California was strong. But there were few trails leading to Sacramento Valley, and those that did, were very dangerous.

In 1851, gold seeker William Nobles stumbled on a more direct northern California route, ending in Shasta. Realizing the commercial importance of his discovery, Nobles lead a party of Shasta businessmen along the route. On their return, they exclaimed, "The mountains are easy of ascent ... (and) watering places ... and the grass abundant." The Nobles Trail carried thousands of settlers west. Eighteen miles of the Nobles Trail ran through what was to become Lassen Volcanic National Park.

Further on were the Chaos Crags, six lava domes believed to have been pushed up more than a thousand years ago. The Chaos Jumbles was the name given to three volcanic landslides that occurred 350 years ago, likely from an earthquake, when one of the domes collapsed. Steven and I didn't walk far off the road to see any more of the Jumbles as they looked like ankle-breakers for sure!

In the northwest section of the park was Manzanita Lake, a relatively young lake compared to those formed by glaciers thousands of years ago. The lake was created about 350 years ago when the steep northwest face of Chaos Crags broke away, crashing and spreading for miles. The avalanche choked off Manzanita Creek, backing off its waters and creating the lake. Plants and animals unusual to other areas of Lassen thrive in this lake. Special to the lake are wild rainbow trout that grow to record sizes, more than twenty inches long, and spawn up Manzanita Creek, which feeds the lake. 

This fellow was one of the more unusual characters we'd come across in a while as we began walking around the lake.

We caught some great views of the Chaos Crags from the trail.

The plug dome volcano at Lassen Peak formed when the lava was too thick to flow great distances. A steam blast shattered Lassen's plug which created an avalanche of melted snow and rock down its east side. Until Mount Saint Helens erupted in 1980, Lassen was the last volcano to erupt on the US mainland. 

From the lake, we wandered over to the visitor center. There, we read a sign that honored the legacy of Loomis, whose enthusiasm, talent and dedication, helped bring this national park into existence. In 1926, he published The Pictorial History of the Lassen Volcano to spark awe and understanding of Lassen's historic eruptive events. 

In 1927, he and his wife built the Loomis Memorial Museum in honor of their daughter and Seismographic Station to showcase Loomis' photographs and monitor ongoing volcanic activity. Loomis wrote that in 1924,"I climbed to the top of Lassen Peak six times ... taking pictures ... I realized that if the mountain should blow off while I was looking into the crater, I would not be here to tell the tale. But for all that I never experienced the feeling of fear. For I was there to take pictures, and the pictures were the principal object of my thoughts." In 1929, the Loomises gave the museum complex to the park to serve as its primary visitor center.

Retaining the right to live on the museum premises, the Loomises built a home and art shop where they spent their summers selling photos, helping visitors, and enjoying the park. Loomis died in 1935 and his wife in 1953.  

Across from the museum was the Lily Pond Nature Trail that we hiked next. The trail started at Reflection Lake. 

Though these trees had been scarred by fire, conifers tend to grow new inner bark to cover their 'wounds.'

This was a thicket of Yellow or Pacific Willow which was typical of lake edges and other wet locations. I never knew before this that individual willow trees were divided into sexes and that the pussy willow produce the pollen-bearing or male flower catkins.The female or seed-bearing plants produce the cotton-like willow down we've all seen blowing around in the mid summer.

Lily Pond was one of several depressions below the normal water table in the Chaos Jumbles. As in other wet places along the trail, the water attracted many aquatic insects, frogs, and birds. Though difficult to spot in this photo, we did see water plants with large heart-shaped leaves called Cow Lilies. 

Lodgepole Pine trees had relatively shallow root structures unlike deciduous trees that send their roots deep into the ground in search of water. I was intrigued by the different types of lichen growing on the trees here and what we'd just observed at Manzanita Lake. Lichen, one of the first plants to adapt to and live under harsh conditions, was also growing on nearby rocks. Once lichens were fairly common in cities but they're rare nowadays because of smog. 

This was one of the most recent avalanches that originated in the Chaos Crags. These rocks were a type of lava called pink dacite, the main component of Chaos Crags and Lassen Peak. We noticed how stunted and sparse the trees were here compared to just a few minutes earlier. It was amazing that anything grew, I thought, in such rocky terrain. 

In the distance were the Chaos Crags, the dacite volcanoes that were rapidly pushed up through vents as lava plugs about 1100 years go. 

This  historic stone building was constructed in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) using local volcanic stone for use as a staff residence. As the Discovery Center, it has been converted for educational programs. The CCC also built many of the trails and roads in the park.

The mountains of Lassen Volcanic National Park have been a sacred place of healing and strength to American Indians for more than a thousand years. The Atsugewi, Maidu, Yana, and Yahi tribes settled in the mountain foothills and spent their summers in camps in the high country. They fished, hunted, and gathered their foods and also worshipped, raised children and buried loved ones here. Descendants of these tribes still lived near the edges of the park and remain connected to this land. 

I was glad that Steven and I had made Lassen our first stop in our discovery and re-discovery of some national parks in the Pacific Northwest. 

Next post: We left Lassen in the mid afternoon for McArthur-Burney Falls Memorial State Park about 45 miles back north again close to where our hotel was located in Burney. 

Posted on September 8th, 2020, from our last couple of days on the other side of the country here at Grayton Beach State Park on Florida's Panhandle before we spend a few days in the central part of the state. As I've noted before, please stay safe, stay healthy, and stay connected during these very trying times.