Lassen Volcanic NP - Bumpass Hell

This was actually on a Park Service sign.

This was the most interesting of our mini hikes Monday. It is a mini pocket of mud pools, steam vents, and other interesting volcan features. It was just as interesting as things we saw in Yellowstone, but not as massive and spread out.

This was a bubbling mud hole. I can't believe people have to be warned to stay away from this stuff.

This pool was really weird. It's hard to tell from the picture, but there is a film of iron pyrite on top. That's right, it's a pool of molten fool's gold.

Lassen Volcanic NP

We arrived at Lassen in teh early afternoon. It was a really nice fall day so started off with a mini hike around Manzanita Lake (not the one pictured below). It was a very mellow 2 mile loop, which was about all I could handle, sadly. We saw some birds and a few fish, but the highlight was the muskrat that was about 2 feet away. It must have had a bank den because it was swimming with a mouth full of grass and dove out of site within a few feet of us. It was pretty cool. We also listened to a rander talk about birds of prey, specifically Bald Eagles and Osprey. We learned a few adaptions they have, such as hollow feathers and specuals on their feet.

Sun. brought full relief from the food poisoning "adventure" so I was ready to get out and explore. Derek humored me by agreeing to check out an 11 mile lakes loop trail. It was a really pretty trail and for most if it we were alone. It was nice to visit the park during off season because few people were in the camp ground, at the sites or on the hikes. This was one of many lakes we saw that day.

We spent Monday moring doing mini hikes. We started out going to Kings Falls. It was beautiful! And once again, we had it to ourselves. The creek is a basically a tiny, narrow creek that snakes through the valley above, but when it hits this canyon it makes a perfect cascade down the rocks. It was a nice volume of water - a very peaceful creek to sit by and enjoy.

The "money" shot of camping. Derek's reflective glasses tell the story.

Another picture from our Lakes loop. I've never seen so much Manzanita. It was the primary ground cover for acres.

Burney Falls

Derek and I headed out to Lassen Volcanic National Park this weekend. We were going to camp at Burney Falls Friday night because it is close to the park entrance and is quite beautiful. I was delayed with a nasty case of food poisoning though so we departed Sat. am instead. We were able to stop at Berney Falls and do some short hikes, enjoy the sun and have lunch on the shore of the lake.

The falls are quite large considering the size of the creek that feeds them. The creek is spring fed and underground within a half mile of this site. It was quite beautiful and I'm glad we were able to stop and enjoy it.

Oregon Caves

Well, it has been a long time since I've blogged. I worked a lot this summer and didn't really have anything interesting to talk about. However, I am back to a normal work schedule so my weekends are once again my own so we've been exploring. I am also very motivated to blog now because Pete has offered us $10. a posting to promote fun things to do in SOOR. Easy enough!

As you can see, we had our second snow of the season this weekend. Snow level dropped to 4 thousand feet so we were in it at the Caves. It was fun, but what happened to fall???

Oregon Caves is worth checking out.

4th of July parade

Happy belated 4th of July! It was a fun one this year. We all pitched in and made a Momentum float so there was a group of us in the parade. It was fun but kind of a bummer becausee we didn't get to see the other floats or things going on.

Pete was nice and drove the van so the rest of us could be irresponsible and drink cocktails at breakfast.

It ended up being an extremely warm day. Hot really, but I guess that's what the 4th of July is about. There was this random Great Dane dressed up in a poodle skirt and the owner said that the the dog could wear anything because he had huge balls. I didn't mean to get a shot of the dog balls, but I discovered that I did when I was going through the pics from the day. Random but so is dressing a dog up in a skirt.

Derek and I finally had a day off together, well part of a day anyway. We decided to go hiking at Grizzley Peak just outside of town. It was very pretty up there and the views of the Cascades was incredible! We saw Shasta, the rim of Crater Lake, Sisters, Bachelor, Thielson - the whole shibang.

There was a fire on the south side of Grizzley a few years ago. It doens't look like it would be pretty from town but it was really nice up there. There were still lots of wild flowers and it was actually fairly plush.

A beautiful day in SOOR

It was another productive Monday. I "shopped" for a new phone this am and after the frustration of that became unbearable I hopped on the bike. I just don't get the whole on-line shopping thing - it's not for the tactile (or the technologically challenged!) It was a bit chilly when I left but it warmed up nicely. Yesterday started cold and ended even colder. I came home and made chicken soup! Wasn't yesterday the 1st day of summer??? Anyway, Jay and I went out for a quick 60 miler. At the 1/2 way point we stopped at this new mini mart out in Ruch. I love the Beans part because it seems especially random.

Siskiyou National Monument

Derek and I went on an adventure today in Siskiyou National Monument. We hiking near Jenny Creek because Derek likes to rock hunt and fish there. He didn't catch any fish this trip but he did find a deer head. It had maggots crawling on it because it wasn't quite picked clean. GROSS! It still stunk too and he picked it up - nasty, nasty.

Here he is holding his 9 point buck. We saw cougar scat near the cabin but not near the deer head. The body wasn't with the head either so who knows what all ate it. It's fun because there aren't any trails in the Monument. It's fun to bush wack and happen across random stuff like this. We also saw a molted snake skin, tons of butterflies and different dragon flies and a few Western Fence Lizards. Not much else.

end of season hike

For our end of season hike we went to a few places along the Rogue River. It wasn't much of a hike, but it was fun to see something new. We went to Mill Creek Falls, Natural Bridges, the Gorge and to some random reservoir. I had never been to any of those places even though I have driven by them several times. At Natural Bridges, the entire river goes under ground into lava tubes. At Mill Creek Falls there is a nice waterfall where Mill Creek dumps into the Rogue. That was pretty, but what was even more interesting was the giant boulders.

I liked how the roots of this tree were growing down the rock in search of cracks in the rocks.

I have been getting into the lichen lately. Here is a picture of Dragon Skin (Loberia oregana). It's a really neat looking lichen usually found only in old growth forests. It indicates a healthy forest ecosystem rich in nitrogen. This particular lichen is also a nitrogen fixer, meaning it has a cyanobacteria living on it that changes atmospheric nitrogen into ammonium, a usuable source of nitrogen for plants. The ammonium leeches out of the bacteria when it rains and makes its way to the forest floor.

Beatrice

Well, Beatrice died. She was a good spider, but I guess her time was up. I've done some research and it appears that female black widows can live for up to a year and a half. We captured her in Oct and she was fairly large then so maybe it was old age. It was quite strange though because she just molted last week. Seems odd that she would soon after just curl up and die. I am suspicious about the bee that I captured and put into her cage two nights prior to her death. I think it was just a carpenter bee or honey bee of some kind. It wasn't aggressive so I'm pretty sure it wasn't some rogue killer bee up from CA. The bee was dead the morning after I put it in there, but that day Beatrice curled up on her log and started to die. The next moring she was belly up in the dirt. Could the bee have stung her??? I don't know and I can't seem to find the answer. In my research I did find that the Mud-Dauber Wasp (pictured below) preys on Black Widows. Interesting.

longest ride

I went out on a 127 mile ride today. It was the longest ride I have ever been on so I was very happy that it felt like we were going downhill all day. Of course, we weren't because we did a big loop, but the winds were at our back on the way back home so it helped us out on the climbs. Jay is training for a cross country adventure starting in July. It's fun to have someone to do really long rides with and since he's training really hard he is always doing really long rides. In fact, this wasn't a long day for him and he's repeating it again tomorrow. ouch! Go Jay!

lichen

I am turning into a blogger slacker these days. Nothing new is happening here though, but I have found a new interest - lichen. Its fun stuff and it's one of my favorite hike topics now-a-days. The kids get a kick out of it too because we get to talk about fire, birds, armpits, etc. The lichen above is called wolf lichen and can be used to make an irridecent brown die. Kind of cool since it's lime green. The one below is called Old Man's Beard and Derek was kind enough to demonstrate why.

skunks

ok, so I'm a freak and usually enjoy the smell of skunks. However, this is the 2nd night this week that one is right outside my window sprayin who knows what. It was so strong the other night that it woke me from a dead sleep and tonight it's keeping me from one. I'm starting to re-evaluate my fondness of these odoriferous critters.

Dwarf Wooly Meadowfoam

Happy Easter! It was a fun day yesterday on the Table Rocks. Derek and I went hiking and explored the top of Upper Table Rock. I wanted to explore the top more since we usually don't have time to do that while I'm hiking for work. The Dwarf Wooly Meadowfoam is endemic to the table rocks and I hadn't seen the flower until yesterday. I was so excited to see that it is finally blooming.

Here is a picture of my new office :) It's great!

"spring" skiing

I am beginning to redefine what I think about spring skiing. In CO it was all about blue skies, soft snow, warm weather and a cold beer on the patio at the end of the day. Apparently spring skiing in the Cascases is arctic winds, freezing ice called snow, bullet proof snow pack (because it is rather warm, just very wet), and white out conditions. It's more about the wind burn than the sun burn I am realizing. Derek and I went out to Grouse Gap today for a nice tour and we were both feeling pretty hard core about it. It was a nice tour though and come May, we might see that thing I love called the sun :)

Am I really getting paid to do this???

I started my new job last week. I spaced bringing my camera on any of the hikes that I got paid to go on, but we'll be beack out there several more times before the season starts. It was a very intense week of training and I'm really glad we have 3 more before we start leading hikes. There is a LOT of information to absorb. Luckily, it is all very interesting, at least to me. I am currently studying up on all the plants, birds, mammals, etc. that can be seen at the Table Rocks. Last week we also learned about the fire ecology, ethnobotony, and Native American history of the region. This week we have firts aid/ CPR training, geology talk, we are learing the kits (the kits are games that we play with the kids to teach them about different animals that can be found on the rocks. We dress a student up as a turkey vulture, a lizard, or a ring tail cat), and whatever else we can fit into a 40 hr week. It's been a great time so far. Derek let me practice talking about all the neat stuff I've learned this week by hiking with me in the watershed this weekend. I bored him to death with every detail that I could remember. It was really helpful and I hope a few more people want to hike before I have to convey all of this information to classes of elementary and junior high school students. Must admit, I'm a bit nervous about that part!

ski touring in the sun to bike races in the rain

We went to San Fran lasst weekend to see Peter and Melissa and to watch a few stages of the Tour of Cali. It was a very cold, wet weekend, but fun to watch the big dogs duke it out. We watched the women's crit in Santa Rosa on Sun. I really wanted to see Sharon the Hammer put the smack down, but she had some unfortunate luck in the 3rd corner of the 1st lap so we just hung out with her after the race instead. It was a short visit, but so it goes when it's 43 degrees and pouring rain.

It was Derek's first bike race. What a great one! We saw a bunch of the fast ladies and of course we saw the men's finish. It was very impressive, even though every one was wearing rain gear so it was hard to tell who was who.

It has been a fun few weeks on the government ski team. Jake and some of his buddies and I all weent to Brown Mountain last week. It was a beautiful day and the snow was perfect. We got 2 laps on the top and then one long 2500 vertical foot run. It was a perfect powder day and so far, the best turns of the season. Yesterday it was a Mt Shasta lift day. They got hammered with snow last weekend so we had to go check it out. It was a load of fun and cheaper than Mt. A! Today we went and got a few runs on a nice north facing slope behind Mt A. It was ok snow, but I struggled with it. Definately challenged me due to my bad habit of over turning. I had some good crashes today - keepin it real. I start my class tomorrow. I am very excited to be back in a classroom and to learn about green building practices.

Mt Shasta

I finally made it down to Mt Shasta for some back country skiing. The conditions were variable but it was fun to be back on a huge mountain. We had a few good powder turns in the morning, hit some hidden rocks and then fought through the crust the rest of the day. We started out with a calm, blue ski morning but by the time we were back at the car the storm had moved in and we were in picking our way back in the freezing fog. When we got to the car we saw a Lemurian
hunter though. She had her face painted green and kind of looked like a witch. The full Mt Shasta experience.

Ranger Rick

I found out this week that I got the job as an interpretive park ranger with the BLM. I am soooo excited! I'll be working out at the Table Rocks in the spring and then out at McGregor during the fall months. I am really excited to learn more about the natural history of this area and be outside for most of the summer. I'll work for Momentum packing trips this spring and summer so I should stay pretty busy. I'm also volunteering with The Green Building Council and have enrolled in a green building practices class. I am really excited about some of the fun opportunities that this horrible economy has created. This is going to be a fun summer!

Annual Bend trip

We ventured off to Bend last weekend to enjoy some skiing. HA! We didn't even get the skies out of the car. It was cold so the bullet proof snow never got soft so we just hiked. Derek decided to brave it and tried to fish for awhile. His line was icing up but it was entertaining to watch him try to stealthily approach the hole. Overall, it was a great weekend of hiking and hanging out. It's warm here in Ashland so I think I'll enjoy my afternoon off and head out on the bike :) Base miles in warm, dry weather - gotta love it!

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and New Years! I spend the holidays with the family this year. It was really nice to get back to CO and see everyone. Holly and Dave came to CO this year so we spent Christmas with Mom and Dad. It was really fun. We played a lot of board games and drank a few martinis. Then they headed to WY to snow mobile and I headed to the lodge to cross country ski for the week. I hadn't seen cousin Matt in 3 years so it was great to catch up with him. He's in Seattle now so I hope to see hime more than once a year.

There wasn't a lot of snow up there, but the skiing was still pretty good. We had quite a few wild life sightings. I saw a bull moose on my way back to the lodge one evening. I also saw a porcupine climbing a tree on an afternoon outing. Peter, Matt and I were lucky to see several elk and a moose with 2 calves on our telemark hill hill day. For the most part, we had sunny skies and warm weather. It was great to catch some rays and be warm!