Reaching 100 years of age is always quite an accomplishment and worthy of a well-deserved celebration. This year, both the National Park Service and Lassen Volcanic National Park reached their 100th birthday. Marking this occasion, several centennial events have been scheduled over the summer and I was able to participate in two activities spread over consecutive weekends.
Lassen Peak Trail Dedication
Lassen Volcanic National Park
The first event was the dedication of the renovated Lassen Peak trail. This multi-year project, funded by the National Park Service and Lassen Park Foundation, moved 2.5 million pounds of stone up the peak to rebuild retaining walls and steps, widen the trail (originally constructed in 1929-1932), and added wayside monument markers. Park Service staff and California Conservation Corp members provided four years of labor on this project. A short dedication ceremony was conducted at the peak parking lot, along with the serving of a dedication cake. After the ceremony, I made a personal celebration by hiking up the renovated peak trail - I believe this may have been my fifth or sixth hike up the peak. At the top of Lassen Peak, we were rewarded with terrific views of the surrounding area and swarms of colorful tortoise shell butterflies. You might be able to see the butterfly swarms in the below video.
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| © 2016, R. Ono |
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| © 2016, R. Ono |
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Tortoise Shell Butterfly
Source: Wikipedia |
Volcano Adventure Camp Celebration
Lassen Volcanic National Park
This past weekend, Lassen Park visitors gathered to celebrate the opening of the Volcano Adventure Camp, a campground for youth groups. This campground updated the previous Chaos Crags campground area with showers, tent cabins and kitchen and cooking facilities. This campground will help at-risk and disadvantaged children gain an outdoors experience without needing to acquire costly camping equipment. Plus, providing upgraded camping facilities for youth groups is an excellent way to promote outdoor interest of our children and young adults. A chance to participate in National Park Service ranger-led activities is a great way to take a break from our electronic devices and begin a lifelong interest in our natural resources. The campground was developed by a partnership between the National Park Service and Lassen Park Foundation.
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| © 2016, R. Ono |
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| © 2016, R. Ono |
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View of Lassen Peak from Manzanita Lake
© 2016, R. Ono |
Burney Falls
With two consecutive weekends in the Lassen area, we found time for a side trip to Burney Falls State Park. While the falls were beautiful, I was surprised to learn that the water feeding the falls is not solely from surface water but from ground water coming from nearby Burney Mountain.
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| © 2016, R. Ono |
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| © 2016, R. Ono |
A Fishing Story
Over the long weekend, I found time to throw a fly line during one of my mornings. The nearby lake I selected for fishing reminded me of fishing in a trout farm pond. Almost every fly line throw was rewarded with a small trout that was then returned to the lake (I "catch & release"). I'm not sure if there were any large trout in the lake, but I soon got tired of constantly dealing with small fish and returned to the cabin. The first time that I recall giving up because of too much success!
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