Initially I was planning to hike in Lassen Volcanic National Park on Saturday by myself. I did not think Journey would want to get up at 4:30AM two days in a row, plus there are some hikes in the park I still want to do. However, I felt bad for Journey the previous day. She had a great time no doubt but it was tough and all off-trail. She loves running ahead of me on the trail, exploring every little thing, and she could not do that. She had to follow in my footsteps the whole time. I know I am overreacting. She loved the hike. Nonetheless I felt I owed her a good hike. Besides, I love hiking with her. It brings me great joy when she is having so much fun and so happy. Returning to Canyon Creek Falls in Lassen National Forest should be a good one for her. It is almost entirely all on-trail. Well, not so much. Sigh.
Once again we were up at 4:30AM. Once again Journey looked at me with an evil eye for disturbing her sleep (kidding).
The trail started off well. Journey was very happy. She was able to run ahead and explore. We came to the short off trail section. This started out great also. It was very easy, just as I remembered. We descended down the other side of the hill and that is when everything went to bat sh*t. The Dixie Fire ravaged this area in 2021. The manzanita brush has grown up since then. I could not find the main trail. It should be very well defined and easy to follow. What the heck? Finally I found it, but it is now very overgrown with manzanita. The trail was not easy to follow at all. For me, once on the trail it was not too horrible (yet. it won’t be long before this trail is impassable). For Journey, however, it was very bad. She had to walk through it and it was hard for her and very hard on her feet. Manzanita is not exactly soft to walk on. She was walking very gingerly as she tried to follow in my steps. This trail should be very easy but is only getting worse and worse now after the fire. Yet another trail going the way of the Dodo bird. Et tu, Brute?
We came to the Lower Canyon Creek Falls, 41 ft. high. The creek was not flowing very well. I was surprised by this considering that nearby Digger Creek Falls was quite nice the previous day. These creeks should be quite similar in size. It was a little disappointing.
My plan was to do the Spencer Meadow loop as I have done before but considering how overgrown the trail is I now had my doubts. Should we just go back? I did not want to subject Journey to more difficulty. We continued up the trail for a short distance and it became clear again before we reached the upper falls. Relief! Journey was happy again. The upper falls was looking quite pathetic so I did not even bother to take any photos of it. Above the upper falls the trail once again became very overgrown with manzanita and Journey had a very hard time but it was another short section and then it was clear again. The rest of the way back to the car was all good. There were probably about 1000 grasshoppers on this section. They were flying everywhere as we hiked through them. The hike ended up being about 5.5 miles in total. It was a wonderful morning in Lassen National Forest.
