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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Sunday, March 28, 2010 at 11:12PM 
