Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve

Indian Tunnel Cave Tour 

Explore a lava tube cave with a Ranger. A paved trail leads through seas of lava. At the end of the trail descend into the strange underground world of a lava tube. Tours begin at 1 p.m. - 2:30 p.m., Daily.   

The park was one of the best maintained parks we have visited.  From newly paved roads to great walking paths as you see in this photo, a lot of U.S. dollars were spent updating this facility.  

Our Ranger discussed many features of the park as we walked along our path to Indian Tunnel.  

At Craters of the Moon, structures representing both inflation and deflation of the lava surface can be seen along with hot and cold collapses of the roofs of lava tubes.  This photo depicts what is call a cold collapse. 

A stairway provides easy entry to Indian Tunnel.  The size of the tube (30' high, 50' wide and 800' long) allows you to walk around but be on the lookout because you can trip easily.

Collapses in the ceiling allow sunlight to enter so a flashlight is not needed to travel in most of the cave. 

On the ceiling of the tube you can see lava stalactites formed as the river of lava pulled away from the ceiling, and molten material began to drip from the hot ceiling.

You can see in this photo, its easy to trip with all the debris on the floor surface. 

If you are willing to scramble over a large pile and climb through a small opening, you can exit this cave at the far end.

Here you can see visitors climbing to exit the tunnel.

At last, I make it out of the tunnel.  

Follow the rock cairns with posts across the lava to return to the paved trail.

North Crater Trail Hike

Here I am at the North Crater Trail head.  This trail is especially interesting for its variety.

The trail leaves directly from the parking lot and mostly over cinders with a short amount of paving at the far end.

The trail traverses North Crater and drops into the crater's mouth.

An eruption tore the wall apart, and a series of lava flows rafted the fragments away.

Kathy found an interesting tree root and decided it would be a great photo op.

The trail continues to the rim of Big Crater.  This Crater was so huge that I had to take several photos to show the entire Crater.

This shows the middle section of the Crater.

Here's a photo of the walking trail along the ridge of the Crater.

This photo shows a side to side picture of the Crater.

While walking, we met a group of geologists from Indiana University. 

The trail is an out and back with a fair amount of climbing and descending throughout the hike. The hike could be a one way if you can arrange for a ride at the Spatter Cones parking lot.  We decided to leave our bikes at the Spatter Cones parking lot and ride the bikes back to the campground. 

Wilderness Trail Hike 

The Wilderness Trail begins at the Tree Molds parking lot.  You walk about .8 miles to the intersection of the Broken Top Loop and the start of the Wilderness Trail. 

This lava field is the largest of several large beds of lava that erupted from the 53-mile south-east to north-west trending Great Rift volcanic zone.

The trail continues past Big Cinder Butte, which rises 700 feet above you.  

Here's the marker showing where the lava trees are located.

The trees were incinerated but as some of them burned they released enough water to cool the lava to form a cast.

Dense shrubs and uneven lava make the going slow and sometimes unpleasant. Wear long pants for bush whacking or your legs will get shredded!

A plant commonly seen on the lava field is the dwarf buckwheat,  a flowering plant 4 inches tall with a root system 3 feet wide. The root system monopolizes soil moisture in its immediate area, resulting in individual plants that are evenly spaced.

The Wilderness Trail hike is 8-miles long however, we decided to hike back following the Broken Top Loop Trail which added another mile to our total hike.  

Balanced Rock - near Castleford-Buhl Idaho

I have to give the credit to seeing Balanced Rock to my Mother-in-law Beverly, who mentioned it to Kathy.   She noticed it in her Atlas and suggested we stop by for a visit.  

 It was an easy thirty minute drive from Twin Falls, ID on old Highway 74 which took us first near Castleford and Buhl. The drive was quite pretty and took us through lots of farm land.  We could not believe how many huge dairy farms we noticed along our route.

  We eventually descended into a canyon that was eerily reminiscent of Bryce Canyon in Utah with it's perpendicular rock formations. We drove along the base of the canyon for less than half a minute, stopped by Balanced Rock State Park, then drove back up out of the canyon to see the Balanced Rock right above us to the right.

We actually thought Balanced Rock was located at the Park but that was not the case.  Had we took a little more time to look at the sign to the bottom right of this photo, we would have known we had to continue another half-mile to Balanced Rock.

Balanced Rock Park may be the narrowest park we have ever seen, with a mere sliver of lawn and a small stream squeezed between the towering walls of the canyon. 

The park boasts a picnic shelter, playground equipment, and restrooms with a canyon view that was quite spectacular.

Every state has it's quirky landmarks, and here in Idaho in addition to it's "famous potatoes" it is Balanced Rock. 

At the base of Balanced Rock is a little picnic shelter, a small parking area large enough to hold half dozen cars, and several unimproved trails leading directly up the hill. We decided to climb up to the rock which only took about five minutes. It wasn't until we reached the base of Balanced Rock, that we realized how huge it actually was.

Balanced Rock is absolutely impossible to miss. It is perched on the edge of the Canyon's rim.  It stands 48 feet tall balanced on a stone 19 inches x 39 inches.

I can tell you that this is the closet Kathy gets to the edge of anything.  I think she is telling me she can push the rock off the base.  It's an amazingly geographical anomaly, and one that has you wondering how it has not managed to fall over after some 20,000 years.

Thanks Mom. It was worth the trip!

Snow Valley Peak Hike - Lake Tahoe

The Snow Valley Hike begins at the Spooner Summit on the North side of Highway 50, 1/2 mile east of the junction with Highway 28.  We started our hike at 8 a.m. The elevation at the trail head is 7199. 

Kathy indicates the hike with her thumb and index finger.  This part of the trail is open to hikers and equestrians.  After hiking this trail, we both question the use of horses on this trail.

After 2-1/2 miles you see a vista sign indicating a 100-yard spur trail leading to a great view of Carson City.  

We took a break 3-1/4 miles into our hike.  The trail rises steeply from the trail head to the Jeffrey Pine Forest.  

This is our first view of Lake Tahoe. 

You can see the snow covered peaks along the California side of the lake.

The views of Lake Tahoe get better and better the higher you go along the trail.

As we travel, we noticed two bikers below us who are riding up a steep bike trail.  The bike trail starts at the North Canyon Campground and ends with great views of Marlette Lake. The ride back to the campground is all down-hill.

Here are three photos of Lake Tahoe from the South to the North.  Our final climb is on a one-mile exposed west-facing ridge.

This is the second photo.  You can see the bikers road along the lower section. 

Here is the third photo looking towards Incline Village.

Finally, we get to enjoy full views of Lake Tahoe and Marlette Lake.  Seeing these two lakes side by side is truly spectacular. 

This is a view of several snow covered areas we had to navigate during our hike.

Here Kathy and I take a break to enjoy our views, snacks and some water.  It took us 3-hours to hike 6 miles to the summit with an elevation of 8974.  The hike was mostly uphill. Our return hike was fairly easy.  We traveled the 6 miles down in 1 hour 59 minutes.  We would recommend this hike to anyone visiting the Lake Tahoe area.  

The six miles we hiked is just a small section of the 165 miles that make up the Tahoe Rim Trail. The Tahoe Rim Trail is one of the world’s premier trails. It passes through two states (California and Nevada), six counties, one state park, three National Forests, and three Wilderness areas as it winds from peak to peak around Lake Tahoe.