I decided to make the most of the sunny warm day that began the new year. I hiked a local trail that, in order to start, I had to overlook something I usually shunned. Then I paid attention to foundational details and different perspectives en route to where I could take a broad view. And it all was great fun and good practice for dealing with whatever happens in 2018.
Right at the beginning I ignored my aversion to the small park where the trail originates. The park is at the top of the mountainside and landscaped to pieces, ecologically speaking. Cute bridges arch over a wannabe babbling brook that usually oozes, albeit artistically, through carefully-casually arranged boulders. There’s a lawn, and even a faux-grotto carved into the steep rocks below the lowest bridge. On January 1st, though, I determinedly reframed “cute” into “charming” as an exercise in tolerance because I had to cross through the park to reach my path.
Even rocks in the park are imported from elsewhere, although not from as far away as the landscaping plants. They originate upslope where the canyon ends and the serpentine outcrop begins.
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Where the trail heads off to the right after crossing the lowest bridge, the manicured park disappears and forest takes over. Huge live and black oaks, ponderosa pines, and bay laurels line the trail and intermingle with wild grapes, ceanothus, coffee berry and poison oak. The slope steepens to nearly vertical just below the trail that parallels the top of the hill (likely why the trees there are old — too much work to harvest them). I hiked sauntered through the forest, leaving the charming park behind as I moved my thoughts to the territory beneath my feet and my destination, a rocky outcrop overlooking Butte Creek Canyon.
Along the trail to the outcrop, plants pull back occasionally and allow glimpses of the opposite cliffside. I couldn’t see the slope stretching down 1,500 feet below me (elevational drop of 1,000 feet). Across the canyon three miles or so are the same layers of stacked substrates the same as what formed the slope beneath my feet. All I could see of the path was reddish brown soil. I inferred that my path was solid by what I saw mirrored across the canyon.
And then the forest closes up again.
I wrote about Butte Creek canyon geology a few years ago.
The lower substrate layer is the 75 million year old sedimentary rock of the Chico formation. Mostly sandstone and marine deposits, it is relatively soft compared to the substrates above it. As the creek carved the canyon, this formation was undercut and rocks from the upper strata tumbled atop the Chico formation. The next layer up is the Lovejoy basalt, about 15 million years old. Basalt is hard, resists weathering, and as the Chico formation was undercut huge slabs of basalt fell down.
Ultimately as the creek cut deeper, the basalt formed cliffs high up on the canyon walls. Above all this, the Tuscan formation is only four million years old and composed of layered ash, volcanic mud flows (lahars) and patches of alluvium. These substrates extend north from here, but not south, and define the transition zone between the Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges.
[Butte Creek] watershed begins at 7,087 foot elevation further north near Mount Lassen, [and] comprises 510,000 acres. The creek runs for 25 miles through the canyon.
On New Year’s Day, I wanted four million year old rocks under my feet, to feel the reliable sun on my face, and wander high above the canyon listening to woodpeckers tapping tree trunks.
Once I reached my rocky outcrop goal, I could enjoy the big open view down the canyon and west across the valley fifty miles or more to the interior Coast Range.
The slope above the rock outcrop exposes the canyon’s recent geological history. Volcanic mud once flowed across the landscape picking up smaller rocks that ended up trapped as the mud solidified 4 million years ago: the Tuscan formation.
Butte Creek Canyon extends along the west edge of my town and is one of our two watersheds. The town’s drinking water originates in the headwaters of Little Butte Creek. The town itself straddles a ridge. One side of the ridge tilts to the west and drains into Butte Creek and the other side slopes east into the Feather River watershed. At the head of the canyon, the ridge narrows and serpentine forms a level strip atop the watershed divide and then continues east and south for miles.
Last month I was at a roadside pull-out above the mouth of the canyon, over three air miles downslope of the rocky outcrop. For the photo below, I stood atop the cliff facing upstream. The rock outcrop I visited New Year’s Day is out of the image in the center right. What you see on the upper portion of the slope in the background is the basalt (top layer).
On a visit a year ago, I photographed the cliff from the creek. This shows the Lovejoy basalt columns at the top.
Some might see the day as just a casual hike with pretty vistas. For me, it was both a simple pleasure and a training session. I allowed myself to enjoy the cute manicured park so I could reach the trail to the rock outcrop. As I strolled, peeks of the layered terrain across the canyon reminded me of the solid support holding the path 1,000 feet above the canyon floor. I was aware of the larger watershed feeding into the canyon and how it all fit into the jigsaw puzzle of my world. I recalled other views of this area from different vantage points that combined to describe where I was on that one day. It reminded me about the importance of where I choose to place myself. New Year’s Day 2018 was an exercise in how to find big picture joy through selecting, knowing, and framing where I am and what I’m doing in the world. Gotta practice that more often.
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