How To Get Away From The Crowds At Lassen National Park

Above, The Beast with Lassen Peak in the background in Devastated Area. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

When I visited Lassen Volcanic National Park four years ago during my Great American Eclipse trip, I had no difficulty in getting a campsite at Manzanita Lake Campground without a reservation. There were plenty of open campsites.

Above, camping at Manzanita Lake Campground. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

In facr, compared to other national parks, Lassen didn't have that many people in it. I had no traffic to contend with when taking drives around the park. And this was during the summer vacation season.

The San Francisco Chronicle has an article on how to get away from the crowds at Lassen during the summer. 

They begin it with:

California’s paramount landscape of fire and ice, Lassen Volcanic National Park, is projected to be fully open for summertime activities by June 25. All the park’s roads, campgrounds and trailheads will likely be open for the first time in seven months, with some high-country trails in sun-shielded sites still covered with patches of snow.

Lassen features a landscape built primarily by volcanic blasts and lava flows, with the last series of major eruptions from 1914 to 1918. Its high country is cut by ice and snow. The park’s 106,000 acres is a matrix of lava peaks, basalt flows and geothermal basins that are set amid forests, lakes and streams. The centerpiece, 10,457-foot Lassen Peak, has just an inch or 2 of snow left on portions of the switch-backed trail that leads up from the parking lot. It is expected to melt off soon.

As a national park, Lassen is like Yosemite’s little brother — it gets about 500,000 visitors each year compared to Yosemite’s 5 million. It is a unique destination for camping, hiking, trout fishing and wilderness treks. The Pacific Crest Trail also runs through much of the park.

With summer fast approaching, here’s a quick guide to Lassen, with ideas on how to enjoy the park’s greatest hits.

Above, Lassen Peak from the Lassen Peak Trail parking area. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

To read more, go here.