Run/Walk in Mt Shasta

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The 4th of July Run/Walk is the big shindig each year in Mt Shasta. It's become so popular chances are you won't find a room if you haven't booked one already. There's a KOA camp in town plus camp sites at Lake Siskiyou, but if you do plan to be in Mt Shasta over the 4th, better find a place to stay now.

Gas is always at least 30 cents higher in Siskiyou County than either Redding or Medford/Klamath Falls, so top off before you come to town. If you think gas prices are high where you are...you ain't seen nothing yet, wail until you stop in Mt Shasta.

If you're wondering how New Zealand and Mt Shasta are connected, read Traveling New Zealand. New Zealand's South Island is similar to the Cascade Mountains.

Groceries are so pricey in Mt Shasta, I seldom shop in town. There's Ray's Supermarket, Mt Shasta Supermarket (smaller with a good butcher shop) and Berryvale (stocked pretty much with health food and organic food.) You can find anything you want in the way of groceries in Mt Shasta, but you'll pay anything they want to charge.

As you probably guessed, I don't own a business or belong to the Chamber of Commerce. I do spend summers in Mt Shasta. I live out of town near a small creek with no close neighbors. My house is on the site of a log deck for an old mill. There's still a few Douglas Firs and Sugar Pines around that the loggers missed about 130 years ago.

Old mills weren't too unusual around Mt Shasta years ago. Most were located along a water source to keep them running. When the Union Pacific shoved its way up the Sacramento River Canyon in the late 1880's they needed railroad ties so mills sprang up to supply the railroads. Once Charlie Crocker got his north-south line connected just over the Oregon border with his division point near Sacramento the forests were open to world wide markets and the mills followed the timber deeper into the hills. Driving up I-5 the logging scars are grown over with brush. You can also see the spot on Mt Shasta where an avalanche took out part of the mountain years ago.

Logging supported the area for many years. McCloud and Weed both have very good logging museums.

Mt Shasta a good spot for summer visitors if you don't let the gas prices and grocery costs scare you off.

Geri

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