Best trails for seeing Lassen NP’s wonders

Mill Creek Falls.
Photo courtesy of Lassen Volcanic NPS.

Among the best ways to see Lassen Volcanic National Park’s top sights is via a day hike. Just four short trails will allow you to enjoy each of the park’s highlights – a volcano that blew during the last century, bubbling mudpots and sulfurous fumaroles, old-growth forests, and waterfalls.

Lassen Peak
The park is home to Lassen Peak, the world’s largest plug dome volcano and the Cascade Range’s southern-most volcano. Though not extinct, it last erupted in 1921, so hikers can head to the summit via the Lassen Peak Trail. While short at 5-miles round trip, it can be a strenuous walk with a nearly 2000-foot elevation gain and high altitudes – the summit is at 10,457 feet above sea level.

Hydrothermal volcanic activity
Each of the four types of volcano – cinder cone, plug dome, shield, and strato – can be found in the national park. A fantastical world of steaming pools and multi-colored soils, all signs and indications of how volcanically active the park is, awaits day hikers on the Bumpass Hell Trail, a 3-mile round trip.

Old-growth forests
Due to the park’s remoteness and early 20th century volcanic activity, much of the landscape exists as it did before Euro-Americans settled northern California. The 4-mile round trip Juniper Lake Trail heads through one of those old-growth forests as well as alongside the park’s deepest lake.

Waterfalls
Only two waterfalls can be found in the park, with Mill Creek Falls, tumbling 75 feet over a cliffside, the tallest of the pair. The Mill Creek Falls Trail runs 3.2 miles to the site.

Find out about trail guidebooks available in the Hittin’ the Trail series.