Banana slugs are a hilariously adorable resident of the Pacific Northwest. On my trip to Olympic National Park and Redwood National Park. I was carefully looking for them in their perfect habitat. Never saw one. But then this guy shows up right at our door step in our cottage parking lot near Willow, California.
I first saw “Fantastic Lava Bed” on a map of Lassen Volcanic National Park and was like “ok, that’s a funny name” – but yeah, they totally live up to their name. They are huge, scenic, and quite fantastic!
The Elk Meadow in Redwood National Park was, only a few decades ago, a giant paved lumber yard with trucks, oil spills, giant cranes, warehouses, and piles of felled old-growth Redwood trees. Now, the National Park Service has helped nature along and the land is a fully restored meadow with bubbling creeks and Elk grazing in the distance.
Driving along I-5 in California, I was taken how seemingly every town was like the world’s producer of some random crop. We drove through a town that produces like 95% of the world’s apricots, another one that does rhubarb, another one that does sunflower seeds. It’s really incredible to see. Also, they all had huge bee boxes along the fields letting the bees do their thing.
I got to see a small Black Bear cub crossing State Highway 96.
On the same trip, I also had a massive male Black Bear dart across the highway in addition to weasels, birds of prey and more. The highway goes through some of the most remote areas that I’ve ever traveled through but still been on a State Highway.
It’s really hard to over-hype Redwood trees. They are the most majestic flora on Earth. And even though they are scattered throughout Northern California, seeing them clustered together in an intact ecosystem is awe inspiring.
Definitely one of the most underrated National Parks. There is not a lot of tourist infrastructure, but my goodness, it is wild, scenic, and alive.
Lassen Volcanic National Park was hit pretty hard by the Dixie Fire of 2021. We got to visit in Summer 2025 and saw not only how the land was recovering, but also how much it still impacted the Park after 4 years.
Lassen Volcanic National Park has all the types of volcanoes within its boundaries. It’s really cool! And Cinder Cone is one type that’s a lot more climbable than the others. It’s tough but straightforward. The volcano is also highly symmetrical and surrounded by the Fantastic Lava Beds!
At Lassen Volcanic National Park, I was surprised by just how volcanic it was, everywhere. And yes, I know it’s in the name. But I was not expecting lava rock to be everywhere and for all the lakes & springs to have a whiff of sulfur and boiling water to them. It feels like the Earth is genuinely alive & active beneath your feet (which, in fairness, it is..). Boiling Hot Springs Lake in the Warner Valley is a little off the beaten track, but we had it all to ourselves on a summer weekend.
In the Southeast corner of Lassen Volcanic National Park, there are entire square miles of lava beds. They are so perfect and so beautiful in their starkness that they were literally called the “Fantastic Lava Beds”. There’s no hiking across them, but there are several excellent trail around and through them. In fact, the original California Trail goes around it.
Lassen Volcanic National Park is a park of colors. Blue water cuts through layers of red, orange, and yellow volcanic rock, coursing through green pines under a blue sky.
Mount Shasta is a potentially active stratovolcano in Northern California. I got to see it on the drive from Crater Lake National Park to Lassen Volcanic National Park.
One of my favorite aspects of the culture of the National Park Service is their commitment to the principle that every American is an owner of their National Parks. It’s a beautiful, democratic ideal.
However.
*like, sometimes I publish…a lot :O – though you can pick what categories you want.
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I’m Nate Shivar from Atlanta, Georgia, USA. I love nature, public lands, books, and the old-school Internet.
