happy independence, everyone!

i hope everyone had a great long weekend... mine was amazing! many thanks to liz for coordinating the efforts, because it was great fun. five of us (me, liz, marla, julia, and heather2) headed up to lassen for a few days of hiking and camping in the sierras. lassen, if you have not been before, is a hotbed of volcanic activity, not unlike the famed sulfuric workings of yellowstone. lassen peak is actually a smaller volcanic cone... the original volcano in the area was mount tehama, a mountain with an 11-mile-wide base, which no longer exists due to other volcanic activity in the area and ice age glacier influence. lassen peak, however, has seen volcanic activity as recently as 1921. liz says that she read that it's due for some more activity soon, although the constant outflow does relieve a lot of the larger-scale pressure.

anyway, so we got up to lassen on saturday, and spent some time exploring the roadside sulfur holes and fumaroles. ("steaming, stinking holes," as liz would like to say. ahh, the first of many ass jokes of the weekend.) we also took a small side trail down kings creek through a smaller alpine meadow out to kings creek falls. lassen is one of those places where the snow never really completely melts... so in some places we were hiking through snow in our shorts, or driving through snowpack of 5-6 feet. pretty crazy! it was warm though (70-75 degrees), so it wasn't a problem to hike in shorts. our lovely campsite was lakeside, and we were well-equipped with a bear locker, fire pit, and plenty of s'mores and cheddarwurst to enjoy.

sunday was our day hike. we took the echo and twin lakes trail loop, which ended up being 10.5 miles or so. i had a really difficult time acclimatizing, which is exceedingly frustrating for me. i know i'm out of shape, but i'm not *that* out of shape. seriously. the rest of the crew i was with is pretty fit, so i was definitely hauling to try to keep up. we hiked through amazing rocky alpine crags, and then down into the lower lake regions... the first lake was came to was unnamed, so marla dubbed it dragonfly lake after the molting dragonflies we saw skirting the lake. what an incredible journey-- these creatures attach their nymph-like bodies to blades of grass or a sunny rock, and have to haul their winged selves out backwards. what effort for such beauty, but truly a sight to see. i'm glad i got to see them. we passed a number of lovely alpine lakes (little bear lake, big bear lake, silver lake, feather lake) and hiked on part of the PCT before we stopped for some lunch. after i mentioned a desire to stop and enjoy the lakes, we found a pristine cinder sand beach which led into the beautiful snowmelt of lower twin lake. it was cold, of course, but not unbearable... in fact, it was downright lovely. julia, liz, and i went swimming while marla and heather2 waded with the hordes of blue damselflies on the beach. ahhh... :) on the way back, we also passed upper twin lake and echo lake, both worthy of future swimming trips. :)

monday morning we packed up camp, and then liz, marla, and i headed out to devil's kitchen. devil's kitchen is another vestige of the surface sulfur activity, and is far larger than any of the sulfuric stuff that you can see from the road. in fact, it's downright remote to get to-- the last three miles of the road into the park from that entrance are unpaved! the upside of that is that it was fairly unpopulated. it was a pretty easy 4-mile hike through amazing alpine meadows resplendent with buttercups, lupines, and multitudes of other flowers and grasses (yes, i need to brush up on my botany) and firewood-stocked forests. the dip down into the valley of devil's kitchen laid out a somewhat desolate-looking landscape-- shades of yellow and lime green and red all over... until you look at the lush algae in the stream that feeds off the additional sulfur. amazing. i hope liz got some good pictures because i didn't feel apt enough to capture it.

and now i'm back in the office. it's very hard to work after a long weekend, especially one you enjoy as much. but i did receive some good news-- chad bell, my best guy friend from high school, proposed to his girlfriend amanda this weekend. that makes me so happy for him! :) the wedding will be early next summer out in columbus, and he already informed me that i need to make plans to come out for it. :) yay!