Lava Beds, Lava Butte, and Lava River Cave

Jill's Journal: See the black area between the near vegetation and the far pine trees? That’s all lava! Honest-to-goodness, real, volcano-spewed lava.

Tuesday we experienced Lava Beds for the first time. We’ve never seen anything like it and found it to be an absolute must-do experience in Bend. It was truly phenomenal and something we won’t soon forget.

The story goes something like this: Somewhere between 6,000-7,000 years ago, Newberry Volcano's Lava Butte first erupted. Newberry is so big it would take somewhere in the neighborhood of 32 Mt. Jeffersons (a nearby, massive mountain that is actually Oregon’s second-highest peak at 10,497 feet) to compare.

This is what a cinder cone looks like from a distance. There are 400 cinder cones around Newberry Volcano. A cinder cone is formed when gas-charged molten rock sprays volcanic foam, or cinders, into the air. They fall back down to earth in a pile. One of these “piles,” which erupted from a fissure on the flanks of Newberry Volcano, is Lava Butte. If you’ve never seen a cinder cone (and we hadn’t), throw away all your illusions about a pile of rocks. Lava Butte rises 500 feet in the air and contains a 150- to 180-foot crater inside.

Here we are driving up the spiral road that leads to the top of Lava Butte. There’s a small parking lot at the top.

And for as big as it is, Lava Butte is just a tiny part of Newberry Volcano, which covers an area of 600 square miles. The whole area is now called the Newberry National Volcanic Monument. It’s one of the largest volcanoes in the lower 48 states.

This photo of Lava Butte from the air is courtesy of the Oregon Tourism Commission.

Lava once flowed from the south side of this butte and poured six miles downhill, blocking the Deschutes River and forever changing its path. Lava Butte’s lava flow covers over 6,100 acres, or approximately nine square miles.

In the 1930s, the Forest Service began using the Lava Butte cinder cone as a lookout station. It’s now open to the public.

In 1966, twenty-two astronauts trained at Lava Butte and Lava River Cave for the upcoming moon landings. This is the crater inside the butte.

The girls at the summit, next to the lookout tower. The wind blows!

The views from atop Lava Butte are spectacular. This is Mt. Bachelor, a popular recreational destination for Bend residents. Mt. Bachelor, as well as Newberry Volcano and South Sister, is dormant. Some of the other snow-covered mountains in sight from Bend (Mt. Jefferson, Mt. Washington, North Sister, and Middle Sister) are extinct volcanoes.

"The most likely volcanoes to erupt here in the next few hundred years are Newberry and South Sister. Geologically speaking, Central Oregon is one of the world’s most active volcanic areas." –Deschutes National Forest

We took the starkly beautiful hike around the rim of the crater.

Built-up lava was everywhere.

The girls were surprised that lava rocks are so light and airy. These are Victoria’s hands.

Here’s the lookout tower from a different perspective across the crater.

This shot is from the rim, directly opposite the lookout tower.

Lava, lava everywhere.

This shot was from the drive back down. It’s amazing how the lava just…stops.

After Lava Butte, we spent a little time at Lava Lands Visitor Center to learn a bit about volcanoes. Newberry last erupted 1,300 years ago. Historically, it has erupted every 300 to 3,000 years.

Then it was off to Lava River Cave, Oregon’s longest known uncollapsed lava tube at one mile long. What exactly is a lava tube? The best I understand it, it’s a flow of lava that crusts over and forms a tube, like an underground pipeline. When the lava stops flowing from the vent in a volcano, the tube drains and leaves what we think of as a cave. They’re discovered by man when part of the roof collapses and exposes the underground tunnel.

Here we are just inside the entrance. If you can see her, Madelyn is to the left (on the steps leading down to the floor of the cave), which helps put the size of the tube in perspective. People are welcome to explore as long as they have at least two light sources with them. The rangers at the entrance rent lanterns and they’re well worth it as we found normal flashlights just don’t quite cut it.

It’s getting darker! That entrance is fading, but we didn’t make it anywhere near the mile deep inside (we heard at the end one has to be on hands and knees before reaching a sand plug that halts further exploration of the cave!). In fact, I’m not even sure we made it a quarter-mile. The footing was difficult and our flashlights weren’t so effective in the pitch dark.

But it was a really neat experience just the same. Lava River Cave remains at a constant temperature of 42 degrees Fahrenheit and the girls sure enjoyed seeing their breath illuminated by flashlight. What an awesome day.