Jan, Chris, and Lyn do another mother/son backpacking trip in Lassen Volcanic Park in northern California. The weather is hotter than expected, and there’s more climbing than expected, but otherwise the first day goes smoothly. We camp at Widow Lake in the park’s northeast corner. The lake is just right for a swim!
The second night of the backpacking trip brings Jan, Chris, and Lyn to Triangle Lake in the Caribou Wilderness. Once again, the reward for hiking on a warm day is a nice swim in the lake. Some deer nose around our campsite after the sun goes down.
Final day of the Lassen/Caribou backpacking trip. To make things easier for Lyn, she and Chris continue heading east on a gentle descent to the trailhead at Caribou Lake. Jan makes a brisk hike back over the past two days’ trail to the starting point at Butte Lake, then drives around to pick up Chris and Lyn.
Family mystery book club. Anya begins reading, “Death on the Nile”, by Agatha Christie, and since Jan’s looking for a book to read, he starts reading it too. When they both hit the 50-page mark, the two stop and compare notes as to which events seems noteworthy and which characters seem suspicious. They continue reading in 50 page chunks, doing their best to puzzle out the solution before the author reveals it. When they finish that book, they read “Murder on the Links”. Angela joins in for “Towards Zero” and “The ABC Murders”.
Anya has recently taken an interest in cleaning up the cluttered common areas of our house. Among other things, she gets a financial reward, but she’s also come to like the way the rooms look when clean.
The rooms don’t stay clean for very long, however. Anya develops a theory as to what causes the rooms to get messy again so quickly. She documents her theory in a comic called, “The Volcano of Doom: An Allegory”. (Liya initially reads the title as, “The Volcano of Poom”, so we occasionally refer to Anya’s theory by that name.) The comic lays out the story of a village destroyed by a volcano. The villagers rebuild, only to have the volcano destroy the village.
Anya says the volcano in the story represents her sister Bree.
Someday we won’t take the kids to doctor’s visits anymore.
Anya pushes for our family to visit the “Infinity Mirrors” exhibit by Yayoi Kusama at the Seattle Art Museum, so Angela waits in line for a couple of hours to get tickets. The exhibit’s mirrored rooms are all pretty interesting.
Bree completes a week-long camp focusing on “wearable tech”. She starts the week experimenting with circuits that can be sewn into clothing and other fabric. For her final project, she sews and writes the code for a cat with an LED collar and a belly that vibrates — as if the cat is purring.
Our friend Satoru enjoys hiking but has never been backpacking, so Jan takes him on a short, one-night backpacking trip at Baker Lake. The two make a short 4-mile hike up from the south trailhead of the East Baker Lake Trail to the Maple Grove campground. It’s a Monday evening, so they have the campground to themselves, and get a great site right on the lake. Looking across the lake, they can see Mt. Baker.
The campsite is quite deluxe as campsites go: a leveled platform for a tent (which someone has padded with moss), a bear box for food storage, a picnic table, and the cleanest, fanciest backcountry toilet Jan’s ever seen. Jan warns Satoru that most campsites will not be as nicely outfitted as this one.
Our friends the Ericksens spend the morning with us at Madison Park. At the playground, Lexie wants to try all the spinning things. Avie runs around the playground for the better part of an hour without stopping. When we make our way down to the beach, Avie and Lexie happily play at the lakeshore, but eventually wade straight in with all their clothes on.
We drive down to Salem, OR, to visit Skye and Jared for the solar eclipse. The path of totality passes directly through Salem, so the town’s a popular destination for people coming from both north and south along I-5. Every hotel and campground for miles is booked out, so we camp in Skye and Jared’s backyard. Cousin Leif, now 3, isn’t feeling well due to a fever, but his new baby brother, Auden, is now 5 months old and full of smiles.
The eclipse action starts around 9:00 am. We watch the moon slowly edge in front of the sun. It’s hard to see much happening for a long time, but when the moon has obscured some 3/4 of the sun, the daylight starts to look strangely flat. When the totality hits around 10:15, it’s completely jaw-dropping. It’s simply amazing to see a black disk in the sky with a bright corona of sun leaking around it.
Bree sews herself a pair of pajamas. She did the pants earlier in the summer at a sewing camp, but didn’t have time to make the top then. She and Angela hunted in a fabric store and managed to find the same fabric (with bunnies!), along with a pattern for a pajama top. Bree really wants to wear these pajamas at Sierra Camp, so Angela helps her race to finish them before we leave. They complete the outfit the night before we leave.
We all head down to Fallen Leaf Lake in California for a week at Sierra Camp. This is our sixth year at the camp, and we all like how this provides a nice capstone to the summer.
A long while back (last year?), we sent a “Ring on a String” game down to the camp — we thought it would be a nice addition, and fit in well somewhere on the camp grounds. When we arrive at camp this year, we find that someone has in fact just set up the game. Jan watches a boy play with it, and the boy’s delighted when he finally gets the ring to catch on the hook.
On the afternoon of our first full day at camp, we hike up to Angora Lake with fellow campers Mike and Steve. The hike is steep but not too long — even the kids groups do this hike. It’s pretty warm, so when we get to the lake, Jan jumps in to cool off. Angora Lake is pretty, surrounded by a rocky ridge, and home to a small set of cabins. We stop in the tiny store there to buy some of their famous fresh lemonade.
The kids spend the day in their respective camp groups: Bree is in Yahoos, Liya in Suaves, and Anya in Teens. Meanwhile, we drive with friends Sherri and Neil to a trailhead on Wrights Lake, then hike up to Island Lake. It’s on the western side of Desolation Wilderness — a side we’ve never seen before.
Happy Birthday, Liya! She’s 14 years old.
For the camp’s “Family Day”, we go with the girls to The Pots (a.k.a. The Potholes) along the Silver Fork of the American River, about an hour away from camp. Anya and Liya visited this river with swimming holes last year. We rely on them to help navigate from the nondescript parking lot to the unmarked trailhead to the best swimming holes. The water’s a bit too cold, and the sun’s a bit too hot, so we spend hours hopping in and out of the water. We’re later joined by friends Sherri and Neil, as well as Paul and Leora and their 3 kids.
Jan’s third hike of the week is a longer one to Ralston Peak and Echo Lake. Angela hikes with another group in the opposite direction, from Echo Lake back to camp. By exchanging car keys in the middle, both groups get to do a one-way trip.