Mount Shasta

A hundred miles south of Crater is Shasta, the highest point in California. Both Crater and Shasta are cone volcanoes, one has already blow its top, the other not quite yet. Eventually, cone volcanoes usually loose it. I was at 7K feet, at the caldera’s lip, but Shasta is 14K+, about the height of Crater, before it blew up, which occurred only 7700 years ago. According to National Park scientists, Native American’s oral histories accurately capture this event. So, Crater, then St. Helen, how much longer does Shasta have? What I like best about the West are its rocks. I guess that’s why on the last two trips I’ve purchased Utah Rocks t-shirts. The geology of the west is so much more active than the rest of the US that it makes what we saw this year seem almost ephemera, at least on a geologic time scale.

We convoyed from Ann Arbor to the cabin. Anne drove her parents car and I was alone in the Prius, blissfully so. It rained off and on through the LP, but cleared before the bridge. They stopped for gas in Rudyard, so I arrived first at the cabin. The oil change light came on again, so I have another chore to do, but not today.