Trailheads and Headwaters

There are of course, the "other places" that were visited over last weekend, that made that trip complete.

I post this for my own kids. They go back and see these photos and Jr. actually reads what is written. She reads "Jr." as Jerr and after some explaining now understands Mr. Jr. Ms. etc. and even knows that Jr. is actuallly a reference to her!

Shasta Dam

The trail loop at Burney falls

Moss covered volcanic rocks

The moss that covers the volcanic rocks

Burney Creek, after it came down the falls, before it joined Lake Briton (there is a panorama shot of Lake Briton in the first Mt. Shasta post)

Burney creek from the trail loop bridge

The water at the falls head, just before it drops off

Bunny flat trailhead

Reflection Lake at Lassen. We did go to Manzanita lake, a place that has been on my wish list for years because the reflection of the mountain in this lake is supposed to be breathtaking. It was so foggy on the lake that visibility was reduced to a few feet. We will go to this park another time, just to see Manzanita lake!

"Hot Rock". No, we are not talking about me! It is a rock that landed miles from the volcanic eruption in 1914 which was found to be hot a year after the eruption. There is a whole field full of rocks this size which just landed there in 1914. One can only imagine the magnitude of the devastation when we see fields of giant rocks and the trees that grow around these rocks almost a 100 years later.

Summit Lake at ~7000 feet

The little one posing at summit lake

Sulfur springs where hot ash gushes out of the mountain side

and becomes a river of ash. We have seen stuff like this in the movie, Dante's Peak. But here for the first time we saw a river of volcanic ash!

Think this place was called Eagle point. This is where we stopped to eat lunch. The sun out come out and we could feel the heat directly. So we remove our jackets and within seconds a gust of cold air that swirls from the mountain would descend on us. It was very weird. We did discover though that home packed curd rice and tamarind rice have the same delicious taste at 8000 feet as at sea level!

This trip had us see our ups and downs in terms of viewing things, but for the first time in a long long time, the kids behaved! They did not fall sick during the trip, get cranky, no "are we there yet" , no "I want to go home right now!" and that was a blessing.

Hope this becomes the new trend!

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Mt. Shasta and Lassen National Park

Another long weekend. Another drive to a national park.

This time, we went to Mt. Shasta and the Lassen Volcanic park area. It was a really great trip. We went with the cousins and as an added treat, my brother happened to land here the previous week for a business trip and my brother in law drove down from Seattle! We were met a bunch of familiar faces at the hotel where we stayed and the kids thought we were going to a wedding in Shasta!

We pretty much covered a lot of places and saw what we could, given the rain, snow and the hiking trails being closed.

Shasta Dam, Lake Shasta, Burney falls, Mt. Shasta, Turtle bay museum, Sundial Bridge in Redding, The arboretum in Redding, Shasta Caverns (which included a boat ride, bus ride up the mountains, a descent into the caverns and another descent on a mountain wall after we exit the caverns!), the Waterhead of the sacramento river where all the underground water channels come out of the mountain wall (which incidentally is where Evian water is bottled) and the entire loop on Lassen national park!

An amazing trip, with harrowing moments when it suddenly rained, and the rain instantly turned to ice on the just plowed highway at 8000 feet with daddy trying to steer a van full of people around a sharp bend. People started reciting whatever slokas they remembered and many "kalpoorams" will be purchased on the next India trip. Daddy is just praying that no "vendudhals" have been made to some remote deity in India like Hairpinbendkaapaathamman which involve tonsuring his head! These days, you never know!

Without further ado, here are the "stitch shots" made of anything from 6 to 21 photos.

Burney falls, wide, majestic, crystal clear waters, it was really beautiful.

Considering that the images are 30 to 51 MB, blogger is not allowing me to upload those the way they are. The remaining pictures are resized to 3k pixels.

This was taken from a boat, as we crossed the Shasta Lake to see the caverns.

Lake Britton, on route 89 from Burney falls to McCloud. The place had an eerie tranquility to it.

Just past the Summit lake trails on Lassen, a little creek that cuts through a field of snow. Did not venture too close to the creek because we could see the ice was too thin and slippery.

Bunny flat, 6950 feet, as far as the road would take us on Mt. Shasta.

Bumpass Hell, a solitary boulder on a ledge, an amazing view of the snow covered hills and the valley below.

We will definitely visit this place again when the sky is clear and we get some contrast between the sky and the snow.

There are always the pictures of the little ones spicing up the landscape. Those come later!

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