Temperatures and blood sugars going up and down all day

Two things happened today that I suspect just may be related: I felt less stress than I have been feeling recently, and my average blood sugar level was the lowest it’s been in two weeks. Hmmm!

Masayo and I got to know Lassen Volcanic National Park and we had to put in some effort to do so since the main road through the Park is still partially closed for winter, but it turns out that Lassen Volcanic, despite being one of those “I bet most people have never heard of this one” Parks, was stunning and unlike any we’ve been to on this trip so far.

We left our accommodation, where our Indian-born hotel owner couldn’t stop complaining, with a heartfelt and genuine despair, about the current heat wave in his adopted home of Colusa, California. “It’s never been like this,” he lamented with sad eyes and a flushed face. Lassen Volcanic is higher in the cool mountains and I agreed with him: this heat is not for me. I was glad to be going upwards.

At the same time, I really enjoyed the drive to the Park and this fact was key to the rest of the day. We passed gorgeous golden fields and gentle, rolling hills, interspersed with extensive groves of trees that stretched far from the road. The voyage through such a fecund agricultural area helped relax me, as did the fact that even if we were into hiking and camping (which we no longer are) there wouldn’t be much of that in Lassen Volcanic NP anyway. So I wasn’t worried about “missing out”, a nice change from every other stress-filled and thus high-blood sugar day since leaving Bryce Canyon NP.

We approached Lassen Volcanic via its south entrance; the road went to the visitor center and then about a half-mile beyond, where a gate blocked cars (but allowed pedestrians) due to uncleared snow in the interior.

Our lunch was a picnic on the side of a stunning alpine mountainside, where we added layers of clothing and looked with awe up at a huge snow-covered peak above dense green trees and below an unbroken, deep-blue sky. I was loving Lassen Volcanic and my enjoyment must have been helping my diabetes: my One Drop meter reported that I was 126. I calculated that I needed nine units of Humalog for the lunch, but only took eight since we planned on doing some walking around.

Then we drove to the gate across the road and parked. Lassen Volcanic is an area of contrasts and variety. Large snowdrifts were melting in the sun, creating sparkling rivulets that ran along the sides of the road, but the deep snow looked like it’d be there for several weeks at least. And in the middle of this thawing wintry land were thermal vents belching steam and, most impressively, a gurgling, boiling pool of mud.

For a few hundred feet around the scalding hot, greenish-brown mud pool the ground was bare and light-colored, with yellow and red splotches from the rich volcanic minerals in the soil. And at every turn, the noisily burbling muck and billowing columns of steam were offset by the spectacle of Rocky Mountains-like snowy slopes and fir trees beyond.

Having seen the heat at the road’s end there was nothing to do in this part of the Park but turn around and exit and drive to the north entrance. This required a long side trip through another mesmerizing landscape. While our rental car’s outside thermometer read 106º we drove, with no other cars around, along tiny and winding roads beside shimmering yellow wheat growing around fields of jagged deep-reddish brown boulders. This part wasn’t actually within the Park boundaries but, like most National Parks, the land outside is similar but different enough to be worthy of a visit in and of itself.

At the north entrance to Lassen Volcanic, whose main draw is Manzanita Lake, the air was cool again and we were able to drive several miles into the Park before the road was closed. This part of the area is different but just as interesting and varied as the southern part.

Like a road in my native north Georgia, much of the Park road here wound lazily through forested areas populated with large grey trees, plenty of shade, and pinecones all over the floor. At one point we had to pull over and park slightly illegally on the side of the road, drawn by bright little points of pinkish red on the ground. A real wonder, these mysterious little guys grew in small clusters, looking like mushrooms that had been bred with pinecones and growing directly out of the ground. They are the only thing that colorful in the area. What show-offs!

It turns out these strange things are called snow plants, and there were a few other tourists wandering beside the road snapping their own photos. How could you not?

if you visit dozens of National Parks you’re going to come across some great names for various places and phenomena, and Lassen Volcanic has one of the best – if not the best – place name of all: Chaos Crags and Chaos Jumbles, which are respectively a group of mountainous lava domes and a rock avalanche field leading to them. We just pulled over and snapped photos of the jagged rocks, where a curious grey lizard jumped from rock to rock alternately eluding my camera and showing off for it.

Unfortunately my blood sugar wasn’t behaving: four hours after lunch I was now 232. Should have had that extra unit at lunch, and then some. I took five units, went and sat on a log beside the road, and ate a protein bar as a snack.

Having seen everything we could of Lassen Volcanic National Park from the opened parts of the highway, we finally tore ourselves away and drove to our new hotel up in Burney, California. The place was overpriced but cozy, and dinner came from the local Subway. After dinner I got low – 64, a very scarce rarity for me these days. After some extra carbs I was back to 127 before bed. An excellent diabetic end to a great day of travel in a breathtaking and obscure corner of northeastern California.

There’s not much on Earth as awe-inspiring as volcanism and lucky us, there’s more of that to come tomorrow before we cross the border into Oregon!

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