Newberry National Volcanic Monument

Newberry National Volcanic Monument
and
Lava River Cave

Lava Lands Visitor Center is a part of the National Monument. Here we were able to go to the top of Lava Butte, a cinder cone volcano rising 500 feet above the surrounding area. The crater in the cone is 150 feet deep.

Lava Butte

In the picture on the left above you can see the road we drove that spirals to the top of Lava Butte, as well as the deep central crater.

The view from the top of Lava Butte was beautiful!

There were squirrels galore at the top of the butte
and I wanted to chase every one of them!

The stripes make them look like chipmunks, but these are actually Golden Mantel Ground Squirrels. You can tell the difference by the face. Chipmunks have stripes on their cheeks too, and the squirrels don't.

Lava River Cave

Lava River Cave entrance.

Lava River Cave is giant tube that carried a hot river of lava from an upper vent of the Newberry Volcano down its flanks to the lower surrounding areas. There are many of these tubes in Oregon, but this is one of the longest at nearly a mile in length.

The first 1,000 feet of the tunnel (not included in the nearly 1 mile length) has collapsed and the path leading to the opening of the cave decends along it's length.