10-July 2016 to 16-July 2016: After having our fill of this lake, we ultimately went back to the Bumpass Hell Parking Lot and decided to gear up and cross the police tape. I figured that it couldn’t be as bad as the “extremely hazardous” conditions that the park was advertising (or at least I thought it was perhaps a little too conservative given how lots of people tend to show up to these kinds of hikes unprepared) and so I was pushing to do the hike.

Of course, when Mom saw the closure sign, she called out to me and wondered if it was wise to do this, which further raised some doubts as to whether my confidence in the park being overconservative was unfounded or not. In any case, I convinced them that we could go on this hike and then be open to turning back when (if) we’d get to parts where it might be too dangerous to proceed. And so we continued on with this doubt in our minds…

• Day 1 (July 10, 2016 – Oakhurst, California): “Beetle Mania”
• Day 2 (July 11, 2016 – Reno, Nevada): “Forcing Functions”
• Day 3 (July 12, 2016 – Red Bluff, California): “Stuck on 89 part 2”
• Day 4 (July 13, 2016 – Medford, Oregon): “Longer Than Hoped”
• Day 5 (July 14, 2016 – Medford, Oregon): “Success After Failure”
• Day 6 (July 15, 2016 – Medford, Oregon): “Sapphire Blue”
• Day 7 (July 16, 2016 – Los Angeles, California): “The Long Marathon Drive”

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