We travelled along Highway 20 and 242. This is the best road if one wishes to see most of the mountains - 3 sisters, Mt Jefferson, Mt Washington etc...
We reached Lava Lands Mountain in Desschutes National Forest
vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Volcanoes/LavaButte/Locale/framework.html along Highway 97 at 1150am. Weather was hot ~28 Degress C. Formation of this Lava lands was caused by a massive Newberry cinder cone erupttion 7000 years ago and produced over nine square miles of lava. The lava is rich in minerals and encourage growth of fur tress. Weather is so hot during summer, fires are frequent.
There's a mini weather station of top of it. Besides the weather instruments like anemometer, earthquake detectors etc, there's also stove for cooking in case the weatherman gets hungry, a sofa to rest too! Not far away we could also see another weather station at another mountain. "mirror flashes" were a form of communication between the weathermen. One thing we learnt was that EACH cumulonimbus cloud has potential to become a lighting cell. And when lighting strikes --->Fire!
Lunch.it's so hot but ppl still do rock climbing!
Mt Washington.
Last stop before returning Washington was Mt Hood. Took a few silly photos and had our teatime at Timberline Lodge www.timberlinelodge.com
