Tuesday Sep 12, 2023 - Zephyr Cove Resort to Lassen Volcano National Park

 

The Resort was fine and they did have showers and hot water and we did use the dump station and refill all our fluids (water tank and toilet). End goal was Lassen Volcano National Park and google maps said there were three ways to get there. We chose door number 2 which is Rt 89 for the most part. This road appeared to go right through the upper Sierra Nevadas and sure enough it did.  A little note on gas prices. The prices vary from $4.95 all the way to $6.19 and it seems the remote places are cheaper which makes no sense. Just say’in…

Our route today first took us to Truckee, CA which is not as near Lake Tahoe as we thought. We stopped there to get WiFi at Micky D’s (and coffee, orange juice and a couple of breakfast McThings. We have had pretty spotty to non-existent cell service. Deb has AT&T and I have Google Fi and sometimes she gets a little service and sometimes I get a little service so WiFi is welcome whenever we can get it.

We saw off and on road construction which makes sense since the weather is great. Nice sunny skies all day. And little did we realize that we would be spending most of the day in what was left after the Dixie Fire in 2021. Wow, was that a big fire. It was almost a million acres and it burned from July through October. Deb here… we passed through the town of Greenville, CA which was devastated by the Dixie Fire. Very sobering to see burned down houses and all of the new construction. Apparently the fire swept through the historic town and destroyed houses within a 30 minute period. Now that we live in a historic town that has had fires sweep through, I have new respect for the power of wildfires.

After a bunch of road construction delays and twisty road, we reached Lassen Volcanic National Park by about 2:30 pm. We asked the ranger on the way in if there was any camping available, and after saying “probably not” he offered that for $10 ($5 with John’s senior pass) we could park outside of the visitor center for the night. They leave access to their bathrooms and water open all night, and there’s a bit of WiFi, so we jumped on that deal.

We then visited the visitor’s center, which turned out to be one of the nicer national park visitor’s centers we’ve seen. After looking at the exhibits, stamping our passport, and watching the 20 minute park film, we decided to head out on the 30 mile road, stop at a trailhead, and go for a hike.

The park road is stunning, filled with twists and turns and beautiful vistas. We stopped at the trailhead for the Bumpass Hell trail, a 2.7 mile trail down to the largest hydrothermal area in the park. It was a beautiful day and lovely trail, and a boardwalk down around the thermal area made it all super interesting. The trail was named after a man, Mr. Bumpass, who guided folks into the thermal areas back in the 1860’s. Apparently on one of his guiding trips he accidentally stepped into a hot area and burned the skin off of one of his legs! That’s how the name Bumpass Hell Trail originated. Poor guy, and what an awful last name.

By the time we finished the trail it was 5:30. We decided to head further up on the park road, but the shadows were encroaching and dinner was calling us, so we turned around and headed back to the visitor center and our camping spot for the night.

There are three RV’s here tonight and it’s really peaceful. We managed to get enough wifi to call Jake and Nath, and then made our dinner. We’ll start tomorrow morning by following the gorgeous park road for the full 30 miles through the park, and then who knows where the road will take us after that?