Chester, CA: Gateway to Lassen Volcanic National Park

We've been flexible as we've journeyed through the state of California. The biggest dot on our itinerary, and the only destination we planned ahead of time, was Yosemite National Park. We also assumed that this would be our last stop in the state before heading back east to Utah for another axle appointment, but we changed our plans because of a pin. Perhaps a strange motivation, but sometimes these are the very precipitators of something fabulous, and that was the case here. We went to Lassen Volcanic National Park without any pressure or expectations and had a great time exploring the few open areas of the southern part of the park, getting our fix of snow before returning to springtime at the lower elevations.

Our visit to Lassen was on a Sunday, one of our favorite days for adventures. Places are usually a tad less crowded than Saturdays, and we have the whole day to enjoy without worrying about work. We got an early enough start to our Lassen ebike excursion that we were finished and back to our campsite before 1pm. We still had the entire afternoon free and wondered what else we could do. That's when I remembered an article I read about small towns to visit in California, and one of them was Chester, located only about 25 minutes from our campground. It's considered one of the gateway towns for Lassen and is also a lake town. We also found out that Chuck Norris has a vacation home here, which led us to the conclusion, "If it's good enough for Chuck Norris, it's good enough for us." We took Tanner to go check it out.

First up was finding a restaurant that had dog-friendly outdoor seating and was still open on a Sunday afternoon. We quickly noticed that many of the places either weren't open on Sunday at all, or closed around 2pm. We scouted out a couple of places before finding Lola's Family Restaurant, a small cash-only joint that offers breakfast and lunch in a mix of American and Mexican cuisines. We sat on the almost-empty front patio and had a delicious brunch of pancakes, chicken fried steak, eggs, home fries, and hashbrowns. We shared bites of appropriate food with Tanny, who was thrilled to be dining al fresco again. The food was delicious and the service was fantastic. The restaurant typically stays open until 3pm on Sundays, but they were closing an hour early to drive to Reno for a food resupply. We got in just under the wire, but the staff didn't rush us at all.

Afterwards we stopped to get a propane refill at the Ace Hardware in town, because RV tasks never stop even on a day out! Temperatures had been dropping into the 30s and 40s at night, so we were using more propane heat than we had in months. Then we went over to Chester Park, where I read that there was a nature trail. We've been trying to schedule in exercise for Tanner every once in a while because we think it helps with his arthritis. He was a bit slow, but we completed 1.3mi through the woods and down by the river, spotting birds, butterflies, and flowers along the way. It was a lovely little walk that made us feel a little less tourist and a little more local.

The nature trail wasn't the main feature at Chester Park. The park has a baseball field and a recreation hall. Our favorite part, though, was the small Almanor Park, named after the town's lake. This park-within-the-park seemed new and was filled with tons of fun outdoor games like cornhole, fooseball, and ping pong. A little cabinet held all the supplies for the games, and it wasn't locked nor were there any signs telling people to put everything back. It was just assumed and expected, and from our observation, people abided.

If we didn't have Tanner, we likely would have spent the better part of an hour challenging each other to the games, but the sun was beating down on us and we instead decided to go for a drive down to the lake.

Lake Almanor spans almost 44 miles, but instead of traveling the whole perimeter, went along the west side on Route 89, the same road that leads through Lassen Volcanic National Park further north. Combined with Route 36, this is the Volcanic Legacy Scenic Byway, which in addition to the national park, runs through Lassen and Plumas National Forests. It's also the road where our campground was located, so after our lake exploring, we'd have a straight shot back to camp.

We found the PG&E Picnic Park on the map and thought that, as a picnic area, it might have nice views. We made that our first stop. As we rounded to the East Shore, we passed an actual scenic vista and made note to stop there on our way back. Turns out, PG&E didn't actually have tons of views, but rather a few peeps of the lake through the trees. However, if you enjoy picnics in the shaded tree cover of the woods, this is the place.

The scenic vista was more of what we were looking for, just a simple pull-off where we could marvel at the blue waters and distant mountains.

Then, for our last stop, we found our way to the Canyon Dam Boat Launch and Picnic Area. On one side are views of the dam and hydroelectric power plant, and on the other, beautiful nature. The boat launch was hopping, which wasn't surprising given the gorgeous weather, but what was surprising is that not a lot of people were using the picnic area, and believe us when we say, we loved our brunch at Lola's, but a picnic here would have been wonderful! We've never seen anything like it. The area, which was clearly designated as day use only, was set up more like a campground. Each picnic spot had its own parking area, picnic table, and grill. Some of the spots were right on the water. Once again, California delivers with its catering to the vanlifers! What a day one could have, to drive the van down to the lake, park for the day, and have a waterfront picnic and beach day. But, even for those of us with rigs too big, it's a great spot to chill out for the day. Bathroom facilities are available, and if you have a watercraft, you could launch it. Or, if you're like me and have a floaty, you could launch that, too.

The only downside is that, compared to the other picnic area, this one seemed more used, and therefore, more littered. More prominently placed trash receptacles would do a lot of good here.

Our Sunday Funday was coming to an end, and we needed to get back to camp to prepare for our week ahead. We spent 6 days in the area but didn't have any other plans. Memorial Day Weekend was coming up, so we had lots of work to get done before the holiday. Our offices for the week would be in our rustic, wooded campsite at the Village at Highlands Ranch, formerly known as the Village at Childs Meadow. This campground is part of the Highlands Ranch Resort, a lodge and motel. It has 24 RV spots and some tent campsites in the back of the property. We'll admit, we chose this campground out of necessity. We wanted to be as close to the Lassen Volcanic National Park entrance as possible, and the other nearby RV park had no availability. This place puts their RV sites back-to-back, so that what looks like one really long pull-thru site is actually two back-ins that share a space. We've only had a site like this once before, last year in Arkansas. It's not our favorite, but we took what we could get.

It turned out great, though. We were just 15 minutes from the park entrance and were surrounded by beautiful meadows in Lassen National Forest. The park was reasonably quiet despite our close proximity to our neighbors. We were also happy to have full hookups for the week. Due to the tall trees, we had to put in extra effort to get our Starlink to work without interruptions, which was a necessity because we didn't have cell service here. We got it working well enough for our work meetings.

The Village RV campground is no frills and doesn't have a lot of amenities. However, we always say that we'd prefer less amenities done well, and this campground had one standout amenity: Frank's Bistro. This on-site bar and restaurant serves up hot dogs, burgers, salads, munchies, and ice cream. On our last full day at the campground, we walked over for a late lunch of BBQ wings, cheesesteak, and milkshakes.

And if you're wondering if we took our al fresco dining loving dog with us, of course we did! We couldn't pass up another chance to see Tanner's face of realization when he catches on to what we're doing.

For a little campground cafe, the food was decent, but we probably would have been just as satisfied only going for ice cream. The milkshakes hit the spot, especially on such a beautiful day.

That lunch marked our final activity in California. The next morning, we packed up and crossed the border back into Nevada. When we first entered California, so much was up in the air. We had no clue how long we'd stay, and we wondered if we had the energy to truly enjoy our travels through the state. Luckily, it's an easy state to love. We ended up staying for exactly a month, and in that time had incredible experiences that are sure to be some of the highlights of our year.