We visited Lava Beds National Monument in far Northern California, as it fit perfectly with our “Volcano Tour” of the Oregon Cascades; while there, we chose to explore several relatively easy Lava Tube Caves within the park.
We left our first night’s camp in Bridgeport early that morning and blasted north along US 395, then turned off to arrive at the monument’s southern entry just past noon. Our timing was perfect, as there were several open campsites in the park’s only campground. We claimed a spot by putting a tablecloth on the picnic table, and paid for it at the kiosk. It was time to go exploring!
First stop: The official Visitor Center. I already owned a Lifetime Senior Pass from the park service, so entry was free and the campsite was half price. It’s good to be retired! We also got our Cave Permit. We read the park brochure and map, which explained about all the lava tube caves and the conditions we might expect. Some required crawling through narrow confines, others wanted scrambling on rough lava boulders, and a few only asked you to duck every so often. These were more our style. But we met several serious spelunkers, wearing knee pads and helmets, who were very gung ho on the crawling aspect of cave exploration. To each his own. We came up with a plan of attack, and marked the caves of interest on our map.
There was a loop road out of the Visitor Center parking lot which passed by a number of caves. We chose to explore Sentinel Cave first. I took my daypack with some water, and we both made sure to have relatively warm clothing and our headlamps. These were caves, after all. It was drizzling out, but we figured the inside of the lava tube would be dry enough. We parked at the lower end, as this cave had two entrances, and hiked down the trail to the cave. The paths were all well-marked, and soon we were descending into a section of the tube whose ceiling had collapsed, thus exposing the tunnel.
It was a chilly Spring day, but the air was quite a bit cooler down inside the tube. The path was well-trodden, and we soon needed our headlamps when the darkness became pitch. The cave was over 3000 feet long, and it was fun to hike through. The main path was perfect for tourists like us, although there were supposedly deeper sections for experienced explorers to check out. There were sturdy steel ladders to climb, guard rails to prevent falling into yawning pits, and metal ramps to cross chasms. Very civilized. And the darkness was fun. We turned off our headlamps to experience it fully, like the tour guides do in other caverns. Dark!
We met one other couple heading in the opposite direction, and they showed us their new UV headlamps, which they had purchased at the Visitor Center. We developed a bad case of Gear Envy, and decided that we needed one as well, even though there wasn’t much fluorescent lava rock around. We mostly wanted to try it out. Plus, it might come in handy elsewhere. You never know.
Eventually, of course, the cave had to end. We began to see signs of light ahead of us, and soon it was very bright. As we neared the upper end, we saw that it was still drizzling. Did we want to walk down the road or return via the cave? Vicki opted for the road, as it was faster. We had several more caves to explore that day!
Next stop: Mushpot Cave. We probably should have started here first, as this cave was the ultimate tourist attraction of the lava tube world. It had a paved floor and electric lighting! There were numerous interpretive displays detailing various aspects of lava tube formation and modern cave life. They even had warning marks on the pavement letting you know when to duck under a low spot. I might sound like I’m making fun of it, but we also learned quite a bit about the tubes, thanks in large part to visiting this cave.
The second cave on the Beginner List of Caves is Valentine Cave. It was quite easy to hike. It also had a relatively unique form of lava inside. The floor and walls were very smooth. There were no chunks of rough stone protruding everywhere. This made it super-easy to hike, but at the same time it was somewhat featureless, as well.
Then we drove over to check out the most-visited cave in the park, which was Skull Cave. You have to admit that it has a great name. And the best part is that there is an actual skull inside! It’s a very deep cave, as if there were two lava tubes one above the other, and there was ice down at the bottom of it.
The ice was near the skull, of course. Some poor bighorn sheep must have fallen to its death from above, long ago. But then again, I didn’t see any other bones, so it may have been carried there by members of the Modoc Indian Tribe in the distant past. They lived in this area and used the lava tubes for shelter.
It was truly cold down there, and we really needed to use our gloves when holding onto the steel handrails of the stairways. Vicki isn’t big on climbing at any time, but she made it out OK by pausing for breath at the landings.
It was late afternoon by that time, and we decided that we’d seen enough lava tubes for now. We drove back to the Indian Well Campground. I got the car ready for a night of sleeping and Vicki cooked some food. This is our usual division of labor, and it works out well. As car campers, we didn’t need to restrict ourselves to freeze-dried backpacking food. We could even eat canned food like chili and stew, or our special trick of adding them to a serving of mac and cheese. Oh, yes. Good stuff. Simple and easy and tasty.
After dinner, we got out the park brochure and made plans for tomorrow. Not far from us was Schonshin Butte, a cinder cone with a classic volcano shape, which supposedly was a short but steep hike. We would wake up early and reach the summit before it got too hot, And after that we’d wing it, and check out a few other things that the ranger had mentioned to us earlier. The rain had stopped, but there was still a chance of showers in the forecast, so we headed into the car and kept the windows mostly closed. That usually meant more condensation on the glass during the night, but we’d worry about that tomorrow morning.
For a topographic map of the hike see my CalTopo Page
For LOTS more photos of the trek see my Flickr Page
Onward to Schonshin Butte >>
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