Day 6: Northern California Road Trip!
The next morning we left the fogged in lassen and headed to our first stop of the day Burney Falls State Park
As we continued on we swung by Lava Tubes National Monument! Much of the park was closed but the visitors tunnel was open and lit! It had a meandering little surface walk with lots of updates on the area and a really cool tunnel entrance. Just be careful the main injury is head lacerations in this NPS site from people hitting there heads on the very sharp lava tube ceilings!
We also took a stroll through the valentine volcano tube. It was one of the most interesting structures I have ever been inside.
The land scape truly looked like something out of a novel
Just north of the lava tubes was Tule Lake National Wildlife Refuge. I wanted to stay there and watch the birds for hours but alas the road trip did not have the time built in for that hobby. There were so many different birds along the lake!
Next up we crossed over into Oregon and drove through Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument. We ended up on the wrong side to be able to hike to the volcano plug but were able to see it in the distance. In our wrong turn adventures we also found a great lunch spot called Salt And Fire Ashland on Oregon 66, it was the perfect afternoon stop and there sandwiches were great!!
We continued on the drive and made it to our cabin in Jedediah Smith Campground, in the Redwoods National Forest. This park had minimal affects from the government shutdown due to it being co managed by the state of California. When we got to the camp ground it was still staffed by California State Park Rangers and all services that were not housed inside federal building were up and going.
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