My friends threw me a surprise birthday party yesterday. It was a lovely gathering.
This marvelous poem was presented to me by the wonderful Lauren and Charlie.
My friends threw me a surprise birthday party yesterday. It was a lovely gathering.
This marvelous poem was presented to me by the wonderful Lauren and Charlie.
Just south east of Portland there is a wonderful rift in the earth through which the hot water bubbles.
The journey to Bagby Hot Springs is an easy drive down paved Forest Service Roads. Once parked, the walk in a about 2 km along a river side path of great beauty.
The springs themselves are fed into private bathhouses (as well as more public tubs). The tubs are carved from single logs.
It was a marvellous final stop on the journey home.
8000 years ago this was the tallest mountain in Oregon.
7700 years ago an eruption swallowed the peak leaving only the rim. Snowmelt eventually created the lake while residual liquid hot magma created a small island in the lake.
The indigenous Klamath people have stories of a battle between the sky god, Skell, and the underworld god, Llao. The mountain was a casualty of the battle and it fell into the earth. Recent archaeology has found footwear buried under ash as well as other evidence corroborating specific detail in the oral account. They watched this happen.
Many sections of the park are still closed due to snow so we left and, after some wrong turns, found our way along some forest service roads to a park entrance that closed in the 50’s. From the end of the road it was less than a kilometre to the old stone welcome sign and some columgnar formations. They are old steam vents whose vapour was so hot the dirt fused to form rock that has outlasted subsequent erosion.
Sooper gnarly geoporn.
As the sun sets, it is clear that beautiful places don’t depend on a time-of-day.
Lava Beds National Monument is the most understated park I have ever visited. It should be named Gnarly Lava Tunnels That You Climb In And Have Your Mind Blown National Gnar.
Alice and Phil discovered this place. Why doesn’t everyone already know about it?!?
From the outside it looks like magma barf of danger.
You roll in, pay your $10 per car, and get handed a map and as many flashlights as you have people. Then you explore cave tubes left behind when the volcanoes packed it in and the liquid hot magma drained.
Inside is magic.
Some of the bacteria on the cave walls glows golden gnar. That is Tess’s favourite.
This is my hand on some drippy bits of cold liquid hot magma.
Intrepid explorers.
But clearly not the first.
Also, Tess is an athlete.
I was in a gambling mood this morning. Fortunately I found myself on the outskirts of Reno. A stop at a gas station provided the slot machine I craved.
I dropped in $5 and left with $10. It was 8 a.m. so I spent most of the winnings on orange juice. Clearly I am cut out for the gambling lifestyle.
Back into California, and onward to Lassen National Park. The afternoon started with a wonderful walk out to some falls.
A mini Tess is visible on the bridge.
The park is all about 7 or 8 dormant volcanoes. Even that cold water stream smelled of sulfur. A short distance up the road things heated up a bit.
Some of the vents just spew steam, others produce a boiling cauldron of mud.
The views were breathtaking throughout the park. Dining on the side of the road as the sun began to drop away was okay too.
Another gorgeous day in California draws to a close…
In the Sierra mountains there is Tioga pass. It is one of the most altitudiness places in the country and seemed a good place to start a hike.
The pass includes the watershed that serves San Francisco but it got only 30% of mean snowfall this past winter so the pass opened earlier than usual. Good for this adventure, bad for San Francisco.
Still a bit of snow and ice at Saddlebag Lake (3087 m).
The rock here is already different than the granite of Yosemite.
Ascending to the mountains from there, I got high (3480 m) and found myself.
I also found an other. Or rather was found by an other.
I think she was also searching for herself but I don’t think she actualized.

This park’s reputation is well earned.
This was the dinner view last night.
And breakfast this morning….
Yup, it’s the halfdome.
For the last couple of nights we have stayed with Brendan and Doris. Their place is lovely and in the heart of San Francisco. The walls are filled with super hip art, like the piece featured below.
They were wonderful hosts, but we feel we’ve left our mark…
Now we head east and then north as we explore our way home.
Yesterday was spent exploring San Francisco by bicycle with Sarah. Last time we adventured together was when she drove to Haida Gwaii with me last year. It has been marvelous connecting on her home turf.
Tess and I rented bicycles and Sarah acted as tour guide.
We took in many of the beautiful and iconic elements of the city.
The views across the bay are just as beautiful as imagined.
We visited one of the holy monuments.
In the end, our 38 km trek us to all corners of the city.
It is definitely a place I could spend much longer exploring…
I’ve long wanted to see the redwoods of California. My only real frames of reference have been the sitka spruce of Vancouver island and, on Haida Gwaii, the sitka spruce and western red cedar.
The coastal redwood has the mantle of “tallest organisms alive on earth today”. The roadside placards take a slightly narrower and, at times, nationalist tone, but that is my interpretation.
A 170 cm human figure is provided for reference.
Here the figure is placed within a cavity of the tree, in a scene that is surely unsuitable for young trees to view.
The view from within the cavity reveals a local tourist with amazing frosted hair tips done by his cousin.
The lush surroundings are quite reminiscent of Haida Gwaii, though slightly less humid. Also awesome: Sarah is to be the San Francisco tour guide tomorrow.
Here the figure is barely visible and hardly useful as a size reference.
The abundance of life is evident to all the senses. Even the smell is invigorating.
A close inspection yields more and more.