me and casey at one of the campsites near mt lassen
After returning from my conference in hot, crowded, muggy North Carolina, I was in desperate need of a West Coast fix. The morning after my plane touched down in Portland, Casey and I packed up the car and headed down to Northern California around the Mt Lassen National Park / Mt Shasta area for some much needed outdoor time. The drive was a bit longer than expected (~6.5 - 7 hours), but was nevertheless filled with beautiful landscapes which kept things interesting.
Unfortunately, late snows prevented us from accessing much of the park (i.e. boiling lakes, the summit of the proclaimed "fearfully grand" Mt Lassen). Bummer. We were, however, still able to check out some of the rad stuff in the surrounding area such as a cinder cone, a glacial lake, and a forest filled with the biggest pine cones I've ever seen (photos of all below)! Sigh...I've missed you, West Coast.
some of the many giant pine cones we saw in the park
he's such a child...
bright moss
casey on the trail to a lake near mt lassen
of course, the clouds rolled in by the time we got to a high enough elevation to see what was around us...
self portrait
lake near mt lassen
another shot of the lake area
reflection lake on the way out of mt lassen national park
scoria cone
casey on his way up
view from the top looking into the scoria cone
painted dunes as seen from the cinder cone
view of the lava field from the cinder cone
sunset at castle rock state park
sunset at castle rock state park
mt lassen sunset as seen from castle rock state park
