On the Road: Tulelake, CA to Lava Beds National Monument, Glass Mountain, and McCloud (2009)

 

June 10, 2009. Left Tulelake in the morning, heading for Lava Beds National Monument. Took the driving route through the Tule Lake National Wildlife Reserve. This place is a birder’s paradise. Saw Great Horned Owls early in the morning, cliff swallows nesting, marsh wrens, eared grebes in breeding plumage, Western grebes, mallards, white pelicans, a ruddy duck, American avocets in breeding plumage, and white-faced ibises, also in breeding plumage, and a Western Meadowlark, not to mention red-winged blackbirds, mourning doves, crows, hawks, and more of the yellow-headed blackbirds we saw yesterday. Less certain was a cinnamon teal sighting.

We moved on to the Lava Beds National Monument area, where the birding was markedly less interesting, although I saw nighthawks at Captain Jack’s Stronghold, the central defensive position of the Modocs during the Modoc Indian War (lower photo). I have wanted to see the site of this battle since reading Rebecca Solnit’s excellent book on Edweard Muybridge River of Shadows: Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild West (Penguin, 2003) which talks about the Modoc Wars and Muybridge’s photographing of the site. The natural lava crenellations make it easy to see why the Modocs chose the area as a place for a last stand. Fabulous lichens in orange and lemon-lime adorn the craggy rocks. Later we toured some of the lava tube caves in the Monument area—Upper and Lower Sentinel, Mushpot, and Skull Cave.

Late in the day we headed for Glass Mountain, having got a tip from one of the rangers about a back way up the mountain that was not closed by snow. I hadn’t even considered snow before setting out, but we were initially told the road to Glass Mountain was closed. The back way turned out to be passable. The road was blocked by snow just before reaching a huge pile of obsidian and chaotically jumbled up welded ash rocks in colors ranging from oatmeal to burnt orange. We arrived, collected a few small pieces of obsidian and got back into the car just before a downpour began (upper photo--all the rock is obsidian, although you can't see the glassy effect well). Then we started the long trip to McCloud, where we had made hotel reservations. Because of the road closures, we had to backtrack for many miles. We finally arrived after 10:30. We had picked up Mexican take-out in Dorris. It was cheap and filling, but offered little more. We ate it in the hotel room in McCloud, washing it down with wine brought from home. I have no idea what's on the agenda for tomorrow.

The hotel in McCloud was nice--the McCloud River Mercantile--a restored 19th century "department store." The owner told me he bought the place about 10 years ago and just finished restoring it about two years ago. Going back to old photographs, the owners have made it look much the way it must have when it was one of the area's major emporiums. The rooms are big and well appointed. Breakfast at the little restaurant next door is included in the room price. The town of McCloud is rather more neat, clean, and sophisticated-looking than most of the little towns in the area. Nearby, visited the local waterfalls, got caught in a downpour, went to the local trout fish hatchery that has an interesting little museum and bookshop with a good selection of books about the area, and then had lunch and started the drive home.