DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

The name sounds like an unfortunately cute play on the rough volcanic terrain. But the Bumpass Hell trail is in fact named for Kendall Vanhook Bumpass, who lost a leg when the ground gave way and dropped him into a 240°F pool of boiling mud.

The stench is awesome. Raw surphur, hydrogen sulfide, and any number of other noxious compounds boil out of the very bowels of the earth, propelled by steam at temperatures up to 464°F. Great clouds of wet gas hiss out of vents, plop out of mudpots, spray out of fissures, rise in steaming gouts to blanket the area with a low-lying funk. When the wind turns your way, you’ll see it. And then you’ll smell it. And then you’ll regret it.

Nonetheless, this was a fantastic hike. The trailhead parking lot was empty, so we enjoyed the trail in solitude. As with the Lassen Peak trail, this one is well-marked and maintained. It leads past a half-dozen staggeringly beautiful vistas, where the land falls away for hundreds of feet into the valley that formed when the original volcano (Mount Tehama) collapsed about 400,000 years ago.

The view of Brokeoff Mountain from this trail yielded one of my favorite pictures from the trip.

It’s an easy hike, climbing 500 feet in a mile, then dropping 250 feet into the stinking crater that inspired the area’s name.

To prevent any modern tourists from contributing a limb to whatever gods lurk beneath the thin, brittle ground, the Park Service has constructed a boardwalk system over the top of the active area, past incredible examples of boiling pools, mudpots, steam vents, and a runoff stream that looks like the output of a chemical plant (and is probably no less toxic). In the half hour we spent there, I learned more about geology than in an entire semester on the subject in college. (Then again, that might be due to the fact that everyone else in the class was on the football team.)

I imagine this is a popular hike, due to its unchallenging nature and otherworldly attraction. Do it early in the day to avoid chatter on the boardwalk and crowds around the mudpots.

See more pictures in my Lassen Volcanic National Park picture gallery.

Raphael bagged his second summit today: Lassen Peak, 10,457 feet. At ten months old, he’s a stronger hiker than I am — he didn’t even break a sweat. In fact I think he slept most of the way to the top.

The Lassen Peak Trail, as seen from the parking lot, is a laughably steep ascent straight up the mountainside. It’s enough to make the backcountry virgins keep their factory-fresh trekking poles safely out of sight in the cargo area of the “Eddie Bauer”-edition Explorer as they mull over their Starbuck’s and pretend they never planned to climb this mountain in the first place, and by the way isn’t there a nice paved interpretive trail around that lake by the park entrance?

I’m an experienced hiker, and I have to admit I was wondering how I’d get up this hill. That can’t be the trail, I thought. But looking left and right, I didn’t see a turnoff. Straight up is the only visible way.

At the point where a steep ascent would become a four-limbed scramble (or maybe eight-limbed in my case), I was relieved to see a switchback, invisible from below. The not-trail ahead of me was, according to a sign, the scar from past hikers taking shortcuts down the mountain. The sign didn’t mention that those particular shortcutters had to have been sliding out of control, “ass over tin cup” as my dad used to say. I mean, there’s no climbing down, much less up that hill; it was about a 45 degree angle. So I stowed my JATO bottles back in the lumbar pack and trudged around the corner.

Raphael collected comments from other hikers, as usual. “That’s quite a load,” said one guy, nodding at the baby carrier. “Yes, but it’s not a problem,” I panted, “we’re taking turns. He’ll carry me back down.” (Remember, the laughs come easier when the air is thin.)

The trail afforded increasingly great views of Lake Helen as well as occasional shots of the trailhead parking lot. (Which reminded me of the Hidden Canyon hike at Zion National Park, the most recent time I was able to see my car from 1000+ feet above.) It was well-maintained, clearly marked, and the signage was first-rate — color photographs, intelligently designed infographics, and informative text described interesting geological formations all around the trail.

The climb is a challenge. The elevation gain is just short of 2000 feet, over a roughly 2.5-mile trail, which averages out to a 15% grade. If you’re in good shape and you’re not carrying part of your family, you could reach the summit in about 65 minutes. I think I took about 90, putting me ahead of my Pike’s Peak ascent rate, although not by much. This was the first hike since Pike’s that I felt I really had to work at, evidence of spending too many hours in the studio and not enough on the treadmill.

The trail ends in a clearing with more signs and panoramic views of the park — and, on clear days, a view of Mount Shasta, 75 miles away. Most hikers stop here, as it’s a natural place to congregate. I appreciate that the NPS hasn’t built a gift shop here.

But the true summit is about 100 yards further on. There isn’t much of a trail, just a well-worn path across the ice field and around the backside of the peak. After that I lost track of it and ended up scrambling straight up the talus. From below it was a disheartening climb because the people at the top looked so small. Five minutes later, as I crested the peak, I realized the people were small because they were 11 years old.

There’s a solar-powered weather station up there, and not much else, except for the sense of achievement of finally finished the climb — by which I mean, there is literally nowhere to go but down — and the pleasure of having left 80% of the tourists behind at the end of the trail.

See more pictures in my Lassen Volcanic National Park picture gallery.

Q: What’s the difference between an RV park and a trailer park?
A: About $10/night.

The park service will send you a list of area lodging, if you ask. We called the few places nearest the park, thinking we’d rather stay close to avoid long daily commute into the park.

The problem is, the place we picked is a dump. You wouldn’t know that from its website, because the owners don’t publish pictures of the “chalets.” Maybe that should have been a clue.

When we arrived, the innkeeper was friendly. She gave us our pick of the seven cabins. I think they were all empty. They stood in a row, lined up along a gravel driveway like so many sacks of garbage waiting for the morning pickup.

The worst thing wasn’t the decor. I’m somewhat used to the 1970s-era shag carpet and dark paneling typical of lodges near national parks. I’ve stayed in a number of dim, depressing cabins; in fact, I’ve stayed in one, in particular, twice in four years, and I’m certain the carpet hadn’t been cleaned in the interim. So I wouldn’t say I have rarefied tastes or complicated requirements, except maybe at dinnertime.

But this place was a couple lumens short of “dim,” a couple symptoms beyond “depressing.” I can describe it in a word, one not normally associated with any place you’d be likely to sleep comfortably for a night, or even pass through without a shudder. The word is “infested.”

Maybe it was only the front porch, which was screened in. Most people use screens to keep bugs out. Here in the mountains, they do things a little differently.

In fact the cabin itself was nice enough, certainly no worse than I expected, although not nearly as nice as I’d hoped considering I’d just spent $150/night on it. But to even get into the cabin, one has to run a veritable gauntlet: the fly farm on the porch.

The door was standing open. (It was a sort of Maginot Line of a screened porch.) Inside, a thousand flies were beating themselves to death against the inside of the screened windows. A pile of fly carcasses had accumulated next to the cabin’s front door. They crunched underfoot.

For color, a few hornets hovered around the ceiling.

I imagined running through this space with my eyes and mouth closed, three to four times a day for the next two days. Worse, I imagined carrying Raphael through there. And I began to wonder if my Visa card’s travel insurance, along with its lost-luggage and cancelled-flight provisions, also has an allowance for “extermination.”

The thing was, we could have booked rooms at the lodge five miles down the road. It looked nicer when we drove by. But how would we manage the innkeeper here at the Maggot Ranch, who at that very minute was waiting for us to tell her which cabin we wanted?

I ran through a few likely scenarios in my mind. None ended well. But we had to do something, so I dredged up my kindest, least confrontational demeanor, and with what I hoped was an apologetic air I suggested to the woman that “we were hoping for something a little more upscale.”

She laughed at me. “‘Upscale?!’ Not around here,” she chortled. She offered me a refund and began the paperwork to undo my reservation. I hesitated to produce my credit card. “But we may be coming back;” I offered, “can’t we just let this be for a half hour while I go look at the other lodge?”

Her answer was direct: “If you don’t like it now, you won’t like it in 30 minutes. You won’t be happy, and I won’t be happy.” I realized I’d insulted her — not my intention, but perhaps not avoidable.

The conversation went on for two or three minutes, as I tried various approaches to a less-final solution. For me, the worst-case scenario wasn’t this lodge, but rather the very real possibility of having to stay in a motel an hour up the road at the interstate.

At one point the woman asked specifically what it was that had bothered us about her property. My facade cracked; for a moment I assumed anyone would be grossed out by having to walk through a cloud of flies to get into one’s home. But I’d underestimated this innkeeper, or should I say “flykeeper;” she laughed at me a second time.

“This is the wilderness!” she exclaimed. “We get all kinds of critters here.” Critters? Flies are critters? “We get coyotes, we get raccoons, we get bears,” she began, reciting a litany of other animal types I’d better not be afraid of now that I’d come into her wilderness, “we get chipmunks, we get snakes, we get — “

“Look, I had a couple foxes run through my back yard yesterday,” I interrupted her, “but I don’t exactly let them into the house to vomit on my pillow while I sleep.” Well, I didn’t really say that, or even think it, really. But it would have been good.

Anyway, her resolve firmed. “Don’t come back” were her final words. Hard to argue with that, especially considering that it was delivered with the proverbial look that could abruptly end life upon receipt. “Hey, nice face,” I didn’t say, “go point that thing at the front porch of Chalet 1 and you’ll save yourself a fortune in No-Pest Strips.”

We found rooms down the road at the Mineral Lodge. They were not quite as “wilderness,” but they were clean and — imagine! — the front porch didn’t look like the tent in those old OFF! commercials.

The new book is out. Do your local democracy a favor and buy a copy today. It’s sure to induce fits of stammering and denials from anyone who’s still a fan of the Bush Regime.

Peter Phillips, the director of Project Censored, told me last Fall that the project’s bandwidth fees skyrocket this time of year, as the world tunes into the website for the annual book release. So, although you can read the book online, ~$19 would go a long way toward ensuring the project’s success.

Here’s just one of the eye-opening stories you didn’t read about in the mainstream press: The US is spending more money in Iraq than on securing the homeland. National security spending has risen just 4% since September 11, 2001. “There are many [U.S.] chemical plants that have no fencing requirements, cameras, and no guards.” We have a “department of Homeland Security,” but whose homeland is getting secured? Hint: I won’t tell you its name, but its initials are not U, S, or A.