May 22, 2026 - Castle Lake

 

Title: May 22, 2026 - Castle Lake
Hike Info : Description : Menu : Animals :  Flowers and Plants

Hike Info:

Type: Hiking

Trail head: Castle Lake Parking Area

Trail:  Lakeshore

Destination: end of trail

Actual Destination: Just past University Nevada testing station

Distance:  0.81 miles

Start Time: 11:45

End Time:   1:33   

Travel Time: 1:47  (0.46 mph)

Moving Time: 0:33   (1.48 mph)

Elevation Rise: 160'

Descent: 112‘

Maximum Elevation: 5,466'

GPS Tracks

Description:

McCloud River at the berm

After yesterday’s evening rain, the night was pretty calm. I slept warm and I do not think Sherri got up as many times last night. Hoping she went to sleep earlier. I got up at 6:30 and went for a walk.

After talking with our neighbor last night I have a pretty good idea where the trail is, but not so sure how to get there. I start off my walk by trying to head directly south from our camp at Cattle Camp Campground. While level and clear and easy to navigate, it quickly became evident that was not the way to go.

I then shifted to looking for a path from the other campground loop. I found a little, use trail at the end of the loop. It quickly ran into the McCloud River Trail. Decision: do I go up it like how I thought of going or down it towards the Falls. I decided down mostly because I was curious about where it crosses the road. The short answer: It does not cross the road. 

 

 

Cattle Camp Swimming Hole

It is a pleasant walk. The trail is marked at certain spots with trail markers, but nothing which shouts out at you saying this is the trail you have been searching for. For about 50 yards, the trail parallels the road, off of it by about 10 yards.Close enough to see the road, but not close enough to see it from the road, unless someone is on it.

I got to the logging road we walked to last night. The trail crosses it about 20 yards in and continues on. There are a few downed trees across the path, but nothing which cannot be easily climbed over. I came to where the trail meets the river. There is a berm there and I walk the berm. There are remnants of an old dam at the end of it. I continue on the trail. The river is nice and flowing. I come to a place where there is a large swimming hole with a rope swinging. I am thinking these people around here really love these rope swings. Well, the reason why, I have come to Cattle Camp Swimming Hole.

Now where does the trail come out? By the outhouse! The one obvious place we did not look yesterday when we were here. I turn around and retrace my steps and come back to the camp. I got to the split where there is a spot to go to the campground. I then realize I must of been on automatic pilot for a ways as I do not remember crossing the logging road. I get back to camp about 7:40.Sherri is still asleep.

Sherri gets up about 8:30 and we have our oatmeal and granola breakfast, along with the add-ins of choice. We talked about where to go and decided on some trails at Castle Lake-one of the places Steve, the ranger, mentioned yesterday. We get things cleaned up and ready to go. But you know that slow camping I mentioned yesterday? We still are slow.

It is after 10:30 before we leave. The road construction is still going on today, but in two places. Fortunately we hit both of them just right and only have to wait a few minutes.Sherri gives me instructions to get to the lake. When we get there, we find a small parking area which is mostly full. A car has just left and we take the spot. Cars are parked down the road. I can only imagine what this place will look like tomorrow.

Water Quality Cabin

We spot a trail and start on it. It says Heart and Little Castle Lake, We go about 50 yards down it and Sherri does not like the look of it. Her foot is still hurting and she is wearing tennis shoes. So we went back to the car. While doing this she reads the information sheet and notes that the starting place is a few feet down the road. So we go down there and find the trail.

This is a short trail, about a mile round trip. It goes along the northern shore of Castle Lake. There is no danger of losing track of this trail. People swim in this lake even though it looks-we did not feel it-pretty cold. We got most of the way on the trail-it is only a half mile long when we saw that people had congregated at the end of it. We turned around, found a nice place to stop and have lunch.

While eating, we observed people across the lake swimming from a raft in the middle of this part of the lake. They swim over to a granite cliff. The raft has something to do with a building behind us called Castle Station run by the University of Nevada, Reno-maybe in conjunction with UC Davis. Sherri reads that they are monitoring water purity.

I rest for half an hour and then we make our way back to the car. About 1:30 we leave and stop in Mt Shasta. I had been working out how many miles we may drive in the next few days and would we have enough gas to make it back to Redding. We filled up 6+ gallons as 6.25 a gallon. This may be the most expensive gas I have ever gotten.

On our way home, there is less construction going on. I had thought about doing three things: Going to the Mt Shasta Trailhead, walking the Military Road or hiking another part of the McCloud River Trail. The Trailhead looked like it might be a long drive. It looked like there was logging going on Military Road. So when we parked, I thought I would rest for about 15 minutes before walking some more.

One note: I reached a new high in my MPG coming back: 113.8 mpg! Our car is a gas only, so no electric assist! Of course there was special circumstances. Having put gas in the tank, I usually zero out the mpg at the station. I forgot and did not discover this until we were coming back. The location? Top of a hill with my forward momentum already going forward. Who knows, I may have already had a tail wind. The next day, the mpg returned to a more normal state.

An hour and a half later, I am still resting, writing up the blog and talking with Gwen. She said they are leaving tomorrow. We are tracking Rachel and Andrea as they are traveling.

When it looks like Rachel is 15 minutes away, I go out to Highway 89 and wait for her.Shortly after I arrive there, she comes in Once she gets settled in, as much as she can since Andrea has the tent, we have dinner. The meal is quesadeas-two per person.With that we are content. Once we clean up from dinner, we go for a walk. We headed out to the McCloud River Trail and walked about ten minutes east. Then turn around and come back to camp.

 

 

 

 

 

Around 9, Rachel and I go to Highway 89 to greet Andrea. She comes in about ten minutes after we arrive. It is good seeing both of our daughters here. Once Andrea gets refreshed, we put up her tent. They then load it up with their camp stuff and it is time to go to bed.

Menu

Breakfast	Lunch	Dinner	Snacks
Oatmeal and add-ins, such as dried peaches, strawberries, nuts, granola.	Peanut Butter, Nutella	Quesadilla	Jelly Belly

Animals

 
Flowers and Plants

May 21, 2026 - Upper McCloud Falls

Title: May 21, 2026 - Upper McCloud Falls

 
Hike Info : Description :Background : Menu : Extra Photo's : Animals : Flowers and Plants

 

 

 

 

 

 Hike Info:

Type: Hiking 

 Trail head: Upper McCloud Falls Parking area

Trail: McCloud River Trail

Destination: walking for about 15-20 minutes

Actual Destination: Lakin Dam

Distance:  .54 miles 1

Start Time: 4:00

End Time:  4:16

Travel Time: 0:15   (2.14 mph)

Moving Time: 0:15   (2.14 mph)

Elevation Rise:  66'

Descent: 64‘

Maximum Elevation: 3,527'

GPS Tracks

 ¹One way-on the return trip.

Description:

McCloud River

It was a bit cool last night. Not that I am shivering kind of cold, just cool enough that I debated putting on my socks and maybe something on my upper body. But my wanting to sleep conquered the coolness. I got up when it was well into being light, but before the sun hit our campsite, around 6:45

I track lightning for our lookouts and for some Forest Service and Park personnel. Before leaving I had sent a message saying I would be out for a week and was not sure about the connectivity. Last night I was able to see there was no lightning in the area I cover. This morning I could not get into the app. I was able to get off an email to the people. One email took about ten minutes to finally get a connection, the other about an hour.

I then went for a short walk down road 39N09. More just to walk and get a feel for where I am. If I followed the road far enough it would take me to the road which goes to McCloud Falls. But I only walked about half a mile. Just enough to get the legs stretched out after yesterday’s long drive. This area is pretty flat so walking is easy.

 I returned and read for a bit until Sherri got up around 8:45. I then made us the oatmeal breakfast-I probably over did it. Neither of us are moving very fast, just getting camping legs under us.While we are not active, the golden mantel ground squirrels are. They get downright friendly, coming on top of the table before we shoe them off.

About 11, I put forward a plan. Let's go to the McCloud Ranger Station and see what they say would be good for us to do. Then we can go for a hike this afternoon after lunch. Seemed like a good plan. Sherri does go and talk with our neighbors: Gwen and Andy from Redding, along with their grandson. I joined them. This means we do not leave the campground until after 11:30

The Ranger Station should be only a 15 minute drive. You know the road construction we ran into yesterday? We got stopped by it again today. This time for about 20 minutes. We get to the Ranger Station a few minutes before noon. There we met Steve, the ranger at the front desk, who gave us some ideas about what to do: Siskiyou Lake, Castle Lake and of course, McCloud Falls were on his list. We left and got back around 12:40.

Neither of us are too hungry-we had a lot of breakfast. Sherri had her PB&jam sandwich and I had some crackers, mozzarella cheese and nuts. Then we rested until just after 2pm.

The McCloud River Trail is close to Cattle Camp, at least that is what both some web sites and Steve indicated. We did not see it. But we did go to the Cattle Camp Swimming Hole. No, we did not swim. We thought the trail might cross someplace close to here. It did not. We thought there was what looked like a trail up the side of a 20’ embankment. If it is, we think maybe this is not the trail for us. Instead we tried to go southwest. This took along the rocky river rock next to the River-OK the sentence is not very good, but you get the idea. This did not seem to be very much fun. So we tried a bit inland. Still nothing-we did find what looked like a trail, but it could be a deer path, but no tracks.^*

Going back to the car, we decided to go back to camp. Instead of going the way we came there, we continued following the paved Tate Creek Road. It curves west and we follow it. There are some roads which intersect our route, but we keep going. I see one sign which says Lakin’s Dam-looks interesting, but we keep going. But we do stop at the Upper McCloud Falls. This is the overlook. I suspect the Upper Falls might be beautiful, from the overlook we can only see parts of it. The temperature is mid-80’s, but it seems hotter than that since the sun is directly overhead.

Resting by the River

When we got back to the car, I asked Sherri if she wanted to do any more walking? No, but if I want to I can. I think I have spotted the trail out of the Upper Falls, heading towards Cattle Camp. So I go up it for about 15-20 minutes. It is well marked. Another man close to my age exchanges pleasantries and noting that we are glad we are out here able to enjoy things. I continued on. This portion of the trail runs along the river. The rock around the trail is volcanic, but the path is mostly dirt. Only about 20 yards has a volcanic rock layer-which I pick my way through being mindful of my age.

The river is fun to watch as it flows by. I go up a ways farther until I see another waterfall. Turns out this is going over a dam. Is this Lankin’s Dam? Whatever it is, it makes for a nice place to stop, view and turn around. I am walking a lot faster going back. A bit because it has a slight downhill slope, a bit because my legs are stretched out, but more so that I had told Sherri I would be go about 15 minutes up the trail, which meant I should be back around 4:15. I get back at 4:20. Along the way, I see what looks like a colorful rubber boa sticking his head out of some rocks.

We got back to camp at 4:45. We rested a bit until I started to feel some drops hit me-not many, but enough to make me wonder if more of them were on their way. When it stops, the pavement does not really show that it rained. About 5:45 I start to make our dinner-not that it is very hard: Frito corn chips, a can of chili, onions and Mexican cheese. I just heat up the chili.

About the time we get cleaned up from eating, it starts to rain, a different rain than before dinner. We make sure everything is prepared: moving anything which would get damaged off the table, putting the chairs under trees-too late for the chair I was sitting in., and making sure the tent is secure. The concern is that we had discovered that one of the viewing panels had disintegrated, leaving a hole in the rain fly. As long as there is no wind, it should be OK.

We retreat into the car, reading and writing. It rains pretty good for an hour-the weather says there was a 4% chance of Precip-what does it know? The benefit is the weather has cleared the air and turned it a bit cooler. Everything looks good, even the tent.

We finished up the day by walking around our loop. Andy and Gwen come by from dropping off their grandchild and we talk for a few minutes. They mentioned a restaurant they like in Mt Shasta called the Pipeline-a craft brewery place. Then we talked with our new neighbor. I had seen him earlier walking by with a walking stick-he looked like he was a hiker. So I asked about where he hiked. He said a trail right outside of camp. He gave us directions to get to it. So we walked the road, hoping to spot it. We walked as far as a logging road. After checking it out on the map, this is road 39N11Y. But no sign of the trail, so we returned to camp.

We got ready for bed and I got back to sleeping bag by 9:30 and am out by 10:00. Not sure what time Sherri got to sleep, but she had got into her sleeping bag shortly after I did.

Background

*The next day, I found the trail and walked down as far as the Swimming Hole. Where it came out was by the outhouse at the hole.

Menu

Breakfast	Lunch	Dinner	Snacks
Oatmeal and add-ins, such as dried peaches, strawberries, nuts, granola.	Peanut Butter, Nutella	Frito Boat	Jelly Belly

Extra Photo's

Night Sky

Lakin's Dam

Upper McCloud Falls

Animals

 
Flowers and Plants

May 20, 2026 - Going to McCloud

Title: May 20, 2026 - Going to McCloud

Sherri at Leatherby's

Hike Info : Description : Menu 

Hike Info:

Type:Car

Description:

I got up at 5:45 and did some things, including breakfast. Last night I got the car 75% packed. Today it is food and a bit more stuff. Turns out there was a bit more and our car is fully packed. We are bringing up much of our food and some gear. Rachel, Steven and Andrea will be coming on Friday evening.

We left home at 9:05. And then in Duran tradition, we returned at 9:10 to make sure we did not forget anything. Then we are off. I am driving. Nothing much to tell. We did stop in Turlock at the rest stop. After that there were two places which we had to stop. There was a traffic accident in Modesto which had us stopped for about ten minutes. Then a more serious accident around French Camp Road. It looked like a crane had been forced off the road. Two out of the three lanes were blocked. We inched along for about 40 minutes.

Instead of getting to Leatherby’s in Elk Grove about 11:30 or 11:45, we got there at 12:35. This is our traditional stop in the area. I had a senior turkey and cheese sandwich and Sherri had a classic chicken sandwich. We shared a Jennifer’s Brownie Delight-I think the server may have gotten us a Deacon Dave’s Brownie Bliss instead, which is a super sized dish.

We left Leatherby’s by 1:35 with Sherri driving. I read a bit and wrote and dozed off. Sherri drove to the Dunnigan Rest Area, about an hour’s worth of driving. Then I drove to Redding while Sherri slept-she had not slept well last night. In Redding, I misread Google Maps when I glanced at which way to go. Eventually we made it to Costco.

We filled up with gas-cheaper than Fresno and were on our way. It is an hour or so drive to the Highway 89 turn off. We passed by the town of McCloud before getting stopped by construction for about half an hour.

Hopefully this is not the theme for this trip. I had told Google Maps to direct us to Cattle Camp. We passed by the McCloud Falls turn off, which I thought Cattle Camp was right off of there, but Google said to go 4 more miles to Tate Creek Road. After going another five miles, we turned around and went back to the McCloud Falls and manually navigated to Cattle Camp. You need to look for the McCloud River Loop sign. There is no sign saying either Tate Creek, Military Road or Cattle Camp. Once on Tate Creek we quickly find the campground.

We arrived at 6:45. Still good light. We thought of camping at a double campsite, but there was not a good place to pitch our tents, especially with possibly of three of them.This was site 6-7. We settled on site #27. Flat and nice with a place to pitch multiple tents. There was another site close to the campground host. But with Korra and possibly Friday, we were concerned they would be barking at the host’s dog.

I pitched the tent and Sherri unloaded the car and got the mattresses blown up. Sherri had a peanut butter sandwich, I had some crackers, mozzarella cheese and nuts. We read and talked until 10:00. I am tired and went to bed. Sherri was up after I went to sleep>Sherri stayed up until just before midnight.

 

Menu

Breakfast	Lunch	Dinner	Snacks
Home	Leatherby’s	PB&Jelly, crackers, moz cheese, nuts.

May 13, 2026 - Angel Falls and Willow Creek

 

Title: May 13, 2026 - Angel Falls and Willow Creek
Hike Info : Description :  Background  :  Flowers and Plants

Hike Info:

Type: Hiking

Trail head: Road at Willow Creek

Trail: Willow Creek Trail

Destination: Minimum Angel Falls 

Actual Destination: 

Distance: 2.55 miles

Start Time: 9:57

End Time:  122:55

Travel Time: 2:58  (0.86 mph)

Moving Time: 1:44  (1.47 mph)

Elevation Rise: 626 '

Descent: 589‘

Maximum Elevation: 3,848 '

Minimum Elevation: 3,452'

GPS Tracks

Description:

Angel Falls

I got up at 5am and did my first lightning report of the season-it was a bit rough, but the feedback I got was that it was welcomed. Sherri injured her foot last night and will not be going with us today. That leaves Steven, Rachel and myself. Rachel comes along a few minutes after 8. We do not rush out then, but manage to leave by 8:45.

One of the things which is making the lightning report hard to produce this year is that the way the data is being fed to me is different. This is causing me to feed Google Earth differently. I am having fits in doing what I want to do with it. I had talked with Rachel last night and today I explained the problem to Steven and we worked through what the issue is.

I was concentrating too much on this problem, as well as the road, that I entirely missed the turn off to Shaver Lake. We discussed what to do and decided to change our hike from Ely Mountain to Angel Falls close to Bass Lake. We notified Sherri of the change in plans and continued going up Highway 41, continuing with the discussion on Google Earth.

Watch Out sign

We get to the turnout where we will start our hike. Really this is just a patch of dirt, wide enough to park cars, having jumped the curb. We get ourselves together and start walking at 9:55.

We started our walk up a driveway which went to some buildings-maybe water filtration. It is only been about 50 years before Steven was born when Sherri and I were last on this trail. Steven leads us on the trail to the north, which crosses a small creek on some planks. Then the trail steeply ascends. A few years ago, I would be bounding up the rocks, even the ones which have water running down them. Now, I am more conscious that if I slip, a bone could break. So I do a lot more picking my way up it. Turns out the rocks have a lot of traction to them, even if they are wet and have stuff on them.

 

 

 

Water leak creates rainbows

Once we come up the initial slope, the trail becomes only a series of gradual inclines with a few descents into shallow ravines. We also get the first glimpse of Angel Falls. The view from our trail is a bit obscured by the foliage around us. While I like views of falls, the greenery does keep us out of the direct sun.

We really do not get a really good view of Willow Creek until we get close to the Falls. From this view, we do not see much of the Falls. But the top of the Falls is a series of teacup holes, which look inviting. No wonder there is a sign at the beginning of the trail saying that there is an average of a death a year from people who cannot get out of the Creek.

The trail follows the Creek and it does not disappoint. While not lush, there is lots of greenery. But not only green, there is a variety of flowers and colors which goes with the flowers. At one stopping place, Steven spots a single mallard, looking like it owns the Creek.

We went about a mile and a half up the trail. There is a second steep section which we debated about going up. It looks like we would be going over an exposed area and it is getting warm. We asked a couple who was coming down if there was a good view from there. They were not very enthusiastic about the view.*

So we turned around and retreated to a beach spot about a third of a mile back. There we had a snack and enjoyed watching the water flow by. I could stay here for a long time, and we did for about 20 to 30 minutes.

The trip up here must have made me stronger, else maybe it was going downhill which was easier. We were able to get to the car by 1pm. I had been concerned about the rocks being wet and be skidding and falling. But that did not happen. 20 years ago I probably would have been quicker and more graceful, but I got down the trail without damage=mission accomplished.

 

 

Where did we want to eat? That seems to the perineal question on any hike. After playing the game of I don’t know, where do you want to eat, we decided to go to our new standby, Los 2 Canales. We enjoyed our meal and then headed home. We got back to the house by 2:20.

Background 

*Suspect that if we had continued up the trail another half of a mile, we would have gotten to another set of falls called the Devil’s Slide.

 
Flowers and Plants

Hartwig Iris

Some sort of pea, I think

Harlequin Lupine