Bothe-Napa Valley State Park
Bothe-Napa Valley State Park is a state park of California in the United States. Located in the Napa Valley, it contains the farthest inland coast redwoods in a California state park; the 1,991-acre park was established in 1960. In 2011 during the California budget crisis, this park and the adjacent Bale Grist Mill State Historic Park were among those targeted to be closed due to lack of funding; the Napa County Parks and Open Space District petitioned the state to operate the park in order to avoid closure. List of California state parks Bothe-Napa Valley State Park–California State Parks Bothe-Napa Valley State Park–Napa Valley State Parks Association
Lassen Volcanic National Park
Lassen Volcanic National Park is an American national park in northeastern California. The dominant feature of the park is Lassen Peak, the largest plug dome volcano in the world and the southernmost volcano in the Cascade Range. Lassen Volcanic National Park started as two separate national monuments designated by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1907: Cinder Cone National Monument and Lassen Peak National Monument; the source of heat for the volcanism in the Lassen area is subduction of the Gorda Plate diving below the North American Plate off the Northern California coast. The area surrounding Lassen Peak is still active with boiling mud pots and hot springs. Lassen Volcanic National Park is one of the few areas in the world where all four types of volcano can be found—plug dome, cinder cone, stratovolcano; the park is accessible via State Routes 89 and 44. SR 89 passes north-south through the park, beginning at SR 36 to the south and ending at SR 44 to the north. SR 89 passes adjacent to the base of Lassen Peak.
There are five vehicle entrances to the park: the north and south entrances on SR 89. The park can be accessed by trails leading in from the Caribou Wilderness to the east, as well as the Pacific Crest Trail, two smaller trails leading in from Willow Lake and Little Willow Lake to the south; the Lassen Chalet, a large lodge with concession facilities, was located near the southwest entrance, but was demolished in 2005. A new full-service visitor center in the same location opened to the public in 2008; the Lassen Ski Area was located near the lodge. Native Americans have inhabited the area since long; the natives knew that the peak was full of fire and water and thought it would one day blow itself apart. White immigrants in the mid-19th century used Lassen Peak as a landmark on their trek to the fertile Sacramento Valley. One of the guides to these immigrants was a Danish blacksmith named Peter Lassen, who settled in Northern California in the 1830s. Lassen Peak was named after him. Nobles Emigrant Trail was cut through the park area and passed Cinder Cone and the Fantastic Lava Beds.
Inconsistent newspaper accounts reported by witnesses from 1850 to 1851 described seeing "fire thrown to a terrible height" and "burning lava running down the sides" in the area of Cinder Cone. As late as 1859, a witness reported seeing fire in the sky from a distance, attributing it to an eruption. Early geologists and volcanologists who studied the Cinder Cone concluded the last eruption occurred between 1675 and 1700. After the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens, the United States Geological Survey began reassessing the potential risk of other active volcanic areas in the Cascade Range. Further study of Cinder Cone estimated the last eruption occurred between 1630 and 1670. Recent tree-ring analysis has placed the date at 1666; the Lassen area was first protected by being designated as the Lassen Peak Forest Preserve. Lassen Peak and Cinder Cone were declared as U. S. National Monuments in May 1907 by President Theodore Roosevelt. Starting in May 1914 and lasting until 1921, a series of minor to major eruptions occurred on Lassen.
These events created a new crater, released lava and a great deal of ash. Because of warnings, no one was killed, but several houses along area creeks were destroyed; because of the eruptive activity, which continued through 1917, the area's stark volcanic beauty, Lassen Peak, Cinder Cone and the area surrounding were declared a National Park on August 9, 1916. The 29-mile Main Park Road was constructed between 1925 and 1931, just 10 years after Lassen Peak erupted. Near Lassen Peak the road reaches 8,512 feet, it is not unusual for 40 ft of snow to accumulate on the road near Lake Helen and for patches of snow to last into July. In October 1972, a portion of the park was designated as Lassen Volcanic Wilderness by the US Congress; the National Park Service seeks to manage the wilderness in keeping with the Wilderness Act of 1964, with minimal developed facilities and trails. The management plan of 2003 adds that, "The wilderness experience offers a moderate to high degree of challenge and adventure."In 1974, the National Park Service took the advice of the USGS and closed the visitor center and accommodations at Manzanita Lake.
The Survey stated that these buildings would be in the way of a rockslide from Chaos Crags if an earthquake or eruption occurred in the area. An aging seismograph station remains. However, a campground and museum dedicated to Benjamin F. Loomis stands near Manzanita Lake, welcoming visitors who enter the park from the northwest entrance. After the Mount St. Helens eruption, the USGS intensified its monitoring of active and active volcanoes in the Cascade Range. Monitoring of the Lassen area includes periodic measurements of ground deformation and volcanic-gas emissions and continuous transmission of data from a local network of nine seismometers to USGS offices in Menlo Park, California. Should indications of a significant increase in volcanic activity be detected, the USGS will deploy scientists and specially designed portable monitoring instruments to evaluate the threat. In addition, the National Park Service has developed an emergency response plan that would be activated to protect the public in the event of an impending eruption.
The NPS tracks visitors by counting vehicles entering the park via in-road inductive loops at all vehicle entrances. Buses and other non-reportable vehicles are subtracted from
Bidwell–Sacramento River State Park
Bidwell–Sacramento River State Park is a state park of California, United States, preserving riparian habitat on the Sacramento River and its tributary Big Chico Creek. The park is located on the border of Glenn County. Popular activities include fishing for salmon and shad; the 349-acre property was established as a state park in 1979. The park's riparian habitat is a good quality example of a disappearing natural resource; the river's various landscapes display constant change. The riparian plant and animal communities depend on each other. Massive oaks and cottonwoods give the dense shade needed for the survival of cool-water creatures. Thick understories of elderberry, wild grape, wild rose and numerous perennials provide shelter to a diversified wildlife population. Indian Fishery Day Use Area is an oxbow lake surrounded by oak woodland; this area is conducive to picnicking, bird watching and hiking. It is common to observe river otters darting through the water, turtles basking on a fallen tree or herons stalking a meal.
Big Chico Creek Day Use Area is characterized by lush river habitat that opens up to a large gravel bar that fronts the Sacramento River. Here park visitors fish, jet ski, water ski and sun bathe; this is the location that many river rafts and tubes exit the river. Pine Creek Day Use Area is a popular location for fishing, kayaking and bird and wildlife watching. Irvine Finch River Access is a 5-acre parking lot and launch ramp affording park visitors an easy way to access the Sacramento River for boating, canoeing or floating on inner tubes. List of California state parks Bidwell–Sacramento River State Park
Carlsbad, California
Carlsbad is a city in North County, San Diego County, United States. The city is 87 miles south of Los Angeles and 35 miles north of downtown San Diego and is part of the San Diego-Carlsbad, CA Metropolitan Statistical Area. Referred to as "The Village by the Sea" by locals, Carlsbad is a tourist destination; the city's estimated 2014 population was 112,299. Among the nation's top 20 wealthiest communities, Carlsbad is the 5th richest city in the state of California with a median household income close to US$105,000. Carlsbad's history began with the Luiseño people. Nearly every reliable fresh water creek had at least one native village, including one called Palamai; the site is located just south of today's Agua Hedionda Lagoon. The first European land exploration of Alta California, the Spanish Portolà expedition of 1769, met native villagers while camped on Buena Vista Creek. During the Mexican period, in 1842, the southern portion of Carlsbad was granted as Rancho Agua Hedionda to Juan María Marrón.
In the 1880s a former sailor named. He began offering his water at the train station and soon the whistle-stop became known as Frazier's Station. A test done on a second fresh-water well discovered the water to be chemically similar to that found in some of the most renowned spas in the world, the town was named after the famed spa in the Bohemian town of Karlsbad. To take advantage of the find, the Carlsbad Land and Mineral Water Company was formed by a German-born merchant from the Midwest named Gerhard Schutte together with Samuel Church Smith, D. D. Wadsworth and Henry Nelson; the naming of the town followed soon after, along with a major marketing campaign to attract visitors. The area experienced a period of growth, with businesses sprouting up in the 1880s. Agricultural development of citrus fruits and olives soon changed the landscape. By the end of 1887, land prices fell throughout San Diego County. However, the community survived on the back of its fertile agricultural lands; the site of John Frazier's original well can still be found at Alt Karlsbad, a replica of a German Hanseatic house, located on Carlsbad Boulevard.
In 1952, Carlsbad was incorporated to avoid annexation by Oceanside. The single-runway Palomar Airport opened in 1959 after County of San Diego officials decided to replace the Del Mar Airport; the airport was annexed to the City of Carlsbad in 1978 and renamed McClellan-Palomar Airport in 1982 after a local civic leader, Gerald McClellan. The first modern skateboard park, Carlsbad Skatepark, was built in March 1976, it was located on the grounds of Carlsbad Raceway and was designed and built by inventors Jack Graham and John O'Malley. The site of the original Carlsbad Skatepark and Carlsbad Raceway was demolished in 2005 and is now an Industrial Park. However, two skateparks have since been developed. In March 1999, Legoland California Resort, LLC was opened, it was the first Legoland theme park outside of Europe and is operated by Merlin Entertainments. Merlin Entertainments owns 70 percent of the shares, the remaining 30 percent is owned by the LEGO group and Kirkbi A/S. Carlsbad is home to the nation's largest desalination plant.
Construction of the US$1 billion Carlsbad Desalination Plant at the Encina Power Plant was completed in December 2015. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 39.1 square miles of which 37.7 square miles are land and 1.4 square miles are water, the majority of, contained within three lagoons and one lake. The northern area of the city is part of a tri-city area consisting of northern Carlsbad, southern Oceanside and western Vista; the ocean-side cliffs fronting wide white-sand beaches and mild climate attract vacationers year-round. Carlsbad has a semi-arid Mediterranean climate and averages 263 sunny days per year. Winters are mild with periodic rain. Frost sometimes occurs in inland valleys in December and January. Summer is rain free, but sometimes overcast and cool with fog off the Pacific. While most days have mild and pleasant temperatures, hot dry Santa Ana winds bring high temperatures on a few days each year in the fall. Carlsbad has Coaster and Amtrak rail service at its two stations, Carlsbad Village station and Carlsbad Poinsettia station.
North County Transit District provides public transportation services in Carlsbad. They operate bus service under SPRINTER light rail service. Interstate 5 and California State Route 78 either border the city of Carlsbad. McClellan–Palomar Airport is located about seven miles southeast of downtown Carlsbad, allows general aviation and limited commercial service to the city. For city planning and growth management purposes, Carlsbad is divided into four distinct quadrants; the northwest quadrant of Carlsbad includes the downtown "Village," the Barrio, "Old Carlsbad." It was the first part of Carlsbad to be settled. Homes bungalows to elegant mansions on the hill overlooking the ocean, it is home to Hosp Grove Park, a grove of trees untouched by development and now designated by the city for recreational use, in addition to the Buena Vista and Agua Hedionda Lagoons. It is located west of north of Palomar Airport Road. "The Barrio" area is near downtown Carlsbad bordered by Carlsbad Village Drive to the north, Tamarack Avenue to the south, Interstate 5 to the east and the railroad tracks to the west.
It was settled by Latinos in the early 20th century. It is the site of the
National Park Service
The National Park Service is an agency of the United States federal government that manages all national parks, many national monuments, other conservation and historical properties with various title designations. It was created on August 25, 1916, by Congress through the National Park Service Organic Act and is an agency of the United States Department of the Interior; the NPS is charged with a dual role of preserving the ecological and historical integrity of the places entrusted to its management, while making them available and accessible for public use and enjoyment. As of 2018, the NPS employs 27,000 employees who oversee 419 units, of which 61 are designated national parks. National parks and national monuments in the United States were individually managed under the auspices of the Department of the Interior; the movement for an independent agency to oversee these federal lands was spearheaded by business magnate and conservationist Stephen Mather, as well as J. Horace McFarland. With the help of journalist Robert Sterling Yard, Mather ran a publicity campaign for the Department of the Interior.
They wrote numerous articles that praised the scenic and historic qualities of the parks and their possibilities for educational and recreational benefits. This campaign resulted in the creation of a National Park Service. On August 25, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson signed a bill that mandated the agency "to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and wildlife therein, to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations." Mather became the first director of the newly formed NPS. On March 3, 1933, President Herbert Hoover signed the Reorganization Act of 1933; the act would allow the President to reorganize the executive branch of the United States government. It wasn't until that summer when the new President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, made use of this power. Deputy Director Horace M. Albright had suggested to President Roosevelt that the historic sites from the American Civil War should be managed by the National Park Service, rather than the War Department.
President Roosevelt issued two Executive orders to make it happen. These two executive orders not only transferred to the National Park Service all the War Department historic sites, but the national monuments managed by the Department of Agriculture and the parks in and around the capital, run by an independent office. In 1951, Conrad Wirth became director of the National Park Service and went to work on bringing park facilities up to the standards that the public expected; the demand for parks after the end of the World War II had left the parks overburdened with demands that could not be met. In 1952, with the support of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, he began Mission 66, a ten-year effort to upgrade and expand park facilities for the 50th anniversary of the Park Service. New parks were added to preserve unique resources and existing park facilities were upgraded and expanded. In 1966, as the Park Service turned 50 years old, emphasis began to turn from just saving great and wonderful scenery and unique natural features to making parks accessible to the public.
Director George Hartzog began the process with the creation of the National Lakeshores and National Recreation Areas. Since its inception in 1916, the National Park Service has managed each of the United States' national parks, which have grown in number over the years to 60. Yellowstone National Park was the first national park in the United States. In 1872, there was no state government to manage it, so the federal government assumed direct control. Yosemite National Park began as a state park. Yosemite was returned to federal ownership. At first, each national park was managed independently, with varying degrees of success. In Yellowstone, the civilian staff was replaced by the U. S. Army in 1886. Due to the irregularities in managing these national treasures, Stephen Mather petitioned the federal government to improve the situation. In response, Secretary of the Interior Franklin K. Lane challenged him to lobby for creating a new agency, the National Park Service, to manage all national parks and some national monuments.
Mather was successful with the ratification of the National Park Service Organic Act in 1916. The agency was given authority over other protected areas, many with varying designations as Congress created them; the National Park System includes. The title or designation of a unit need not include the term park; the System as a whole is considered to be a national treasure of the United States, some of the more famous national parks and monuments are sometimes referred to metaphorically as "crown jewels". The system encompasses 84.4 million acres, of which more than 4.3 million acres remain in private ownership. The largest unit is Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska. At 13,200,000 acres, it is over 16 percent of the entire system; the smallest unit in the system is Thaddeus Kosciuszko National Memorial, Pennsylvania, at 0.02 acre. In addition to administering its units and other properties, the National Park Service provides technical and financial assistance to several "affiliated areas" authorized by Congress.
The largest affiliated area is New Jersey Pinelands National Reserve at 1,164,025 acres. The smallest is Benjamin Franklin National Memorial at less than 0.01 acres. Although all units of the Nat
Fort Point, San Francisco
Fort Point is a masonry seacoast fortification located on the southern side of the Golden Gate at the entrance to San Francisco Bay. It is the geographic name of the promontory upon which the fort and the southern approach of the Golden Gate Bridge were constructed; the fort was completed just before the American Civil War by the United States Army, to defend San Francisco Bay against hostile warships. The fort is now protected as Fort Point National Historic Site, a United States National Historic Site administered by the National Park Service as a unit of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. In 1769 Spain occupied the San Francisco area and by 1776 had established the area's first European settlement, with a mission and a presidio. To protect against encroachment by the British and Russians, Spain selected Punta del Cantil Blanco, a promontory with a high white cliff located at the narrowest part of the bay's entrance, to construct a fortification; the Castillo de San Joaquin was constructed in 1794, subordinate to the nearby Presidio de San Francisco.
It was an adobe structure housing nine to thirteen cannons. Mexico won independence from Spain in 1821, gaining control of the region and the fort, but in 1835 the Mexican army moved to Sonoma leaving the castillo's adobe walls to crumble in the wind and rain. On July 1, 1846, after the Mexican–American War broke out between Mexico and the United States, U. S. forces, including Captain John Charles Fremont, Kit Carson and a band of 10 followers and occupied the empty castillo and spiked the cannons. Sometime during the Spanish and Mexican eras, the Punta del Cantil Blanco came to be known as the "Punta del Castillo", carried over into the era of U. S. sovereignty, in rough translation, as "Fort Point". Following the United States' victory in 1848, California was annexed by the U. S. and became a state in 1850. The gold rush of 1849 had caused rapid settlement of the area, recognized as commercially and strategically valuable to the United States. Military officials soon recommended a series of fortifications to secure San Francisco Bay.
Coastal defenses were built at Alcatraz Island, Fort Mason, Fort Point. The U. S. Army Corps of Engineers began work on Fort Point in 1853. Plans specified that the lowest tier of artillery be as close as possible to water level so cannonballs could ricochet across the water's surface to hit enemy ships at the water-line. Workers blasted the 90-foot cliff down to 15 feet above sea level; the structure featured seven-foot-thick walls and multi-tiered casemated construction typical of Third System forts. It was sited to defend the maximum amount of harbor area. While there were more than 30 such forts on the East Coast, Fort Point was the only one on the West Coast. In 1854 Inspector General Joseph K. Mansfield declared "this point as the key to the whole Pacific Coast...and it should receive untiring exertions". A crew of 200, many unemployed miners, labored for eight years on the fort. In 1861, with war looming, the army mounted the fort's first cannon. Colonel Albert Sidney Johnston, commander of the Department of the Pacific, prepared Bay Area defenses and ordered in the first troops to the fort.
Kentucky-born Johnston resigned his commission to join the Confederate Army. Throughout the Civil War, artillerymen at Fort Point stood guard for an enemy; the Confederate raider CSS Shenandoah planned to attack San Francisco, but on the way to the harbor the captain learned that the war was over. Severe damage to similar forts on the Atlantic Coast during the war – Fort Sumter in South Carolina and Fort Pulaski in Georgia – challenged the effectiveness of masonry walls against rifled artillery. Troops soon moved out of Fort Point, it was never again continuously occupied by the army; the fort was nonetheless important enough to receive protection from the elements. In 1869 a granite seawall was completed; the following year, some of the fort's cannon were moved to Battery East on the bluffs nearby, where they were more protected. In 1882 Fort Point was named Fort Winfield Scott after the hero of the war against Mexico; the name was applied to an artillery post at the Presidio. In 1892, the army began constructing the new Endicott System concrete fortifications armed with steel, breech-loading rifled guns.
Within eight years, all 103 of the smooth-bore cannons at Fort Point had been dismounted and sold for scrap. The fort, moderately damaged in the 1906 earthquake, was used over the next four decades for barracks and storage, however, in 1913, part of the interior wall was removed by the army in their short-lived attempt to make the fort the army detention barracks using soldier and prisoner labor; the detention barracks were built on Alcatraz Island and was used until becoming a federal prison. Soldiers from the 6th U. S. Coast Artillery were stationed there during World War II to guard minefields and the anti-submarine net that spanned the Golden Gate. New quarters and administrative buildings were constructed on the higher ground, behind the new Endicott batteries, moving Fort Scott to this location. In 1926 the American Institute of Architects proposed preserving the fort for its outstanding military architecture. Funds were unavailable, the ideas languished. Plans for the Golden Gate Bridge in the 1930s called for the fort's removal, but Chief Engineer Joseph Strauss redesigned the bridge to save the fort.
"While the old fort has no military value now," Strauss said, "it remains a fine example of the mason's art.... It should be preserved and restored as a national monument." The fort is situated directly below the southern approach to the bridge, u
Calaveras Big Trees State Park
Calaveras Big Trees State Park is a state park of California, United States, preserving two groves of giant sequoia trees. It is located 4 miles northeast of California in the middle elevations of the Sierra Nevada, it has been a major tourist attraction since 1852, when the existence of the trees was first reported, is considered the longest continuously operated tourist facility in California. Parcels of land that would become the state park and nearby national park were optioned by lumberman Robert P. Whiteside in January 1900, with the intention of logging. A protracted battle to preserve the trees was launched by the California Club. Despite legislation in 1900 and 1909 authorizing the federal government to purchase the property, Whiteside refused to sell the land at the offered price, preferring its higher valuation as parkland, it was not until 1931 that Whiteside's family began to divest the property, beginning with the North Grove. The area was declared a state park in 1931 and now encompasses 6,498 acres in Calaveras and Tuolumne counties.
Over the years other parcels of mixed conifer forests, including the much larger South Calaveras Grove of Giant Sequoias, have been added to the park to bring the total area to over 6,400 acres. The North Grove contains about 100 mature giant sequoias. According to Naturalist John Muir the forest protected by the park is: "A flowering glade in the heart of the woods, forming a fine center for the student, a delicious resting place for the weary."The North Grove includes two sequoias that were cut down or mutilated only to be reassembled in exhibits. The "Discovery Tree" was noted by Augustus T. Dowd in 1852 and felled in 1853 leaving a giant stump and a section of trunk showing the holes made by the augers used to fell it, it measured 25 feet in diameter at its base and was determined by ring count to be 1,244 years old when felled. At the time the grove was discovered by white explorers, the Discovery Tree was measured by Dowd and others as the largest tree, it was cut down to advertise the tourist attraction.
The stump was turned into a dance floor. John Muir wrote an essay titled "The Vandals Then Danced Upon the Stump!" to criticize the felling of the tree. A second tree named the Mother of the Forest was stripped of its first 100 feet of bark. Today only a fire-blackened snag remains of the Mother of the Forest, the Discovery Tree has been renamed the Big Stump. In addition to the popular North Grove, the park now includes the South Grove, with a 5-mile hiking trip into a grove of giant sequoias in their natural setting; the South Grove includes the Louis Agassiz tree, 250 feet tall and more than 25 feet in diameter 6 feet above ground, the largest tree in the Calaveras groves. It is named after zoologist Louis Agassiz. Other attractions in the Park include the Stanislaus River, Beaver Creek, the Lava Bluff Trail, Bradley Trail; the park houses two main campgrounds with a total of 129 campsites, six picnic areas and hundreds of miles of established trails. The iconic "Pioneer Cabin Tree" known as "The Tunnel Tree", fell in 2017.
Measuring 33 feet in diameter, its exact age and height were not known. In the 1880s, the tree was hollowed out by a private land owner so that tourists could pass through it; the tree was estimated to be over one thousand years old. Some speculated, it was one of several drive-through trees in northern California. Other activities include cross-country skiing, evening ranger talks, numerous interpretive programs, environmental educational programs, junior ranger programs, mountain biking, bird watching and summer school activities for school children. Dogs are welcome in the park on leash in developed areas like picnic sites, campgrounds and fire roads. Dogs are not in the woods in general. Calaveras Big Tree National Forest Chandelier Tree - another tunnel tree, but a coast redwood not a giant sequoia List of giant sequoia groves List of California state parks Mother of the Forest Calaveras Big Trees State Park Calaveras Big Trees Association "The Pioneer's Cabin and Pluto's Chimney - Big Tree Grove, Calaveras County - B&W Film Copy Neg".
Library of Congress. 1866. Retrieved January 9, 2017
