Weekend in Lassen and Napa
 

I had friends that came to visit me for a long weekend (Friday June 12-Wednesday June 17), and on our weekend we decided to check out Lassen, with a stop in Napa on the way back.

Having not heard much about Lassen, I wasn't sure how much I would like it. I had heard from some people it's one of the hidden gems of CA, and from others that it was just ok and wasn't worth driving out of the way to see. I must say I agree with those who think it's a hidden gem. We absolutely LOVED Lassen, and wished we had more time to spend there. Even though this was a quick weekend trip, the biggest reason I wanted to write this trip report was to hopefully make more people aware of Lassen and how wonderful it really is. I had never heard of it before I started researching things to do while I am out here in Santa Clara this summer for an internship. Even then, I had to search for National Parks in CA (I wanted to get the most use out of my annual park pass) before the name ever popped up.

We started out leaving the Woodside area on a Friday evening after work. Thanks to advice on a previous thread of mine, we decided to eat first then attempt our fight with traffic. I picked my friends up at the Hillsdale Caltrain Station around 5:30pm (they came from SFO, and I was looking for the station closest to San Mateo Bridge), and we headed over to BJ's Restaurant and Brewhouse for dinner. I had fish and chips, which was pretty good. We finally left the restaurant around 7:30pm for our drive to Lassen.

The route we finally decided on based on advice from Fodorites and friends at work was this one: San Mateo Bridge over to 580-680-80-5-CA99-CA70-CA89. It may not have been the most efficient way, but we arrived (or should have arrived) around midnight, and we only hit traffic once for about 20 minutes. I say SHOULD HAVE because somehow my GPS confused the address of the hotel on Main St in Chester, CA (we stayed at the Best Western Rose Quartz Inn) with the same address on Main St in Quincy, CA. So we took a little detour and ended up not arriving til 1am. However, it meant we got to see a bear and quite a few deer (one buck with his antlers still in velvet), so we didn't complain too much. But we got checked into the hotel (which was great) and went on to bed so we could be up at a decent time to start our day in Lassen.

I'll talk about the first hike we did in this post, but I promise to post more later (and hopefully pictures!). So, for our first hike we decided on none other than Bumpass Hell. It was the first one we came to (on our itinerary) entering the park from the southern end after a drive through the mountains with beautiful overlooks. We started our hike, only to come upon a wonderful view in a few hundred feet of Lake Helen underneath Lassen Peak across the road to our left. We decided to save exploring here for our return trip, and went on to Bumpass Hell. We stopped along the way to take pictures of the beautiful overlooks (I was seriously not expecting them to be as gorgeous as they were), until we came to a spot with a bench and few signs that overlooked Bumpass Hell. We descended, and were completely amazed. We've never seen geothermal features before, and we absolutely loved it. It made me that much more excited for my upcoming trip to Yellowstone in July. We spent at least 45 minutes just along the boardwalk checking out everything and taking pictures. Our favorite feature was probably the mud pots. They were so interesting to watch! And the color of the water flowing in the creek as you enter the geothermal area is unreal, such a pale but almost milky blue (it's a very hard color to describe!). Once we had finally had our fill of admiring the area (and the wonderful smell of sulphur), we hiked back up to the bench (where my friends needed to stop and catch their breath - the altitude can get you if you aren't in good shape or used to it!) before heading back to our car. One of my friends has a fear of heights, and she was quite nervous along portions of this trail (which made for slow going at times), but I wouldn't consider this trail really exposed. And she made it despite her fear, and was glad she did. My friends stopped at Lake Helen while I ran back to get the car and meet them there, and we stopped to take a couple pictures. The water is very pretty and clear, and it just makes for a great view with Lassen Peak in the background.

Next, we visited Kings Creek Falls…

Glad you enjoyed it. Lassen is really a neat park. We try to go into the park at least once a year.

You guys did sort of take the long way around to Chester, but not too bad - other than the detour over to Quincy, I don't think that the route you took ended up being too much longer. This is one of the reasons why I always recommend paper maps in addition to GPS for traveling in the mountains though - a small mistake with the GPS could really take you off track. In your case, it wasn't a big deal, but it can be.

I agree! And the first thing I did Saturday morning was buy a road atlas for future trips :) It should come in handy for my road trip back to VA in July.

The next hike we did was Kings Creek Falls. It was so different from Bumpass Hell, which was neat to see so much variation in one park. My friends enjoyed this hike more because they were in the woods, although I actually enjoyed the expansive vistas of the Bumpass Hell hike more. But, the meadows and woods of Kings Creek were beautiful as well. When we got to the area where the trail splits, we found that the steep section that stays along the creek was closed for repairs, so we were forced to take the upper trail. We actually didn't go much further, only to the lookout point where you could look down on the falls. The falls were very pretty, and again the expansive view from the point was beautiful as well. We hiked back to the car and continued on the Manzanita Lake.

My original plan had been to do Chaos Crags as well, but my friends aren't quite as ambitious when it comes to hiking as I am :) . So instead, we just continued on to Manzanita Lake. Along the way, we enjoyed the views of Lassen Peak (I assumed) from the other side, and it actually looks much larger on this side we thought. We got to the lake around 4 or so (my original plan was to get there later, closer to sunset), and decided to walk around to the far side for some nice views with Lassen Peak in the background. It was wonderful! My friend commented as she was taking pictures that she felt like the pictures were right out of a nature magazine. Along our walk (even though it's 2 miles around the lake I don't call it a hike because it's very flat and a nice walk), we met a guy carrying his towel. We found out he planned to go swimming (which we didn't know we were allowed to do before we got there). Well, we saw him jump in and we couldn't resist. So we jumped in in our clothes too! The water was a little chilly at first, but we got used to it quickly. We made sure to take plenty of pictures, because when will I ever get the chance to swim in a lake in California again with a snow capped volcano behind me? After our swim, we walked the rest of the way around the lake. We passed lots of people kayaking and paddle boarding, and had I had known this was an option, would have rented one for an hour or so. It's such a pretty place to just relax and paddle around, and would have been a nice ending to our day. After we finished, we went back to the car so we could continue on our way to our hotel in Redding.

We drove on to the Baymont Inn and Suites in Redding to check in then head to dinner. The girl at the front desk was very nice and helpful, and the rooms were nice as well. We asked for a good steakhouse close by, and she recommended Cattlemen's. I had seen these since I've been out here, but hadn't tried one yet, so we decided to go (plus our room keys got us 10% of our meals). We changed out of our damp clothes, which is also when we noticed that we all had nice farmer's tans and burnt foreheads. We had been too preoccupied with dousing ourselves in bugspray (thanks to a recommendation from a friend) that we had forgotten the sunscreen! Lesson learned - make sure to put on sunscreen or you will have a red and peeling forehead at work on Monday morning that your coworkers will laugh at you for :) We were starving by this time, so finished changing and went on to Cattlemen's. The steaks were very good, but I was a little disappointed I couldn't substitute another side item for the baked beans. I wasn't going to eat them but the waitress insisted she had to bring them because they were complimentary with the meal. So, they sat untouched on the table. But overall the meal was very good and we left very full and happy. After our dinner we went back to the room to get some sleep (I think my friends were still tired from Friday - they had flown from VA, spent the afternoon in San Francisco, and then we didn't get to our hotel in Chester until 1am) before heading to visit a winery in Napa on Sunday.

A side note about Lassen - we really wanted to visit the Cinder Cone and Fantastic Lava Beds in the northeast corner, but didn't leave time to drive all the way around. In order to get there, you actually have to leave the park and drive around, then reenter in the northeast entrance. I do wish there was some type of road that would allow you to just turn off the main road and drive over there instead of going around but also understand the importance of leaving the park as pristine as possible. My friends never would have made the hike up the Cinder Cone, but if I ever make it back this is definitely on my to-do list, along with the Lassen Peak hike.

I will finish the trip report this weekend, complete with pictures. I'll go ahead and warn you that my friends and I are NOT wine drinkers, so we chose one of the more touristy wineries to visit, Castello di Amorosa. But, we did have fun, and that's what really matters, right? :)

Here's the link to my pictures from Lassen.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/134162...57654393720100