“What we call landscape is a stretch of earth overlaid with memory, expectation, and thought … Landscape is what we allow in through the doors of perception.” – Scott Russell Sanders
CLEARLAKE, Calif. – Austin Park is located at 14077 Lakeshore Drive, Clearlake.
The park is 20 acres of vibrant landscape, including a playground, softball fields, restroom and a skate/biking park.
Here along Clear Lake you can take a swim, take out the kayak or canoe, or just take in the marvelous mountain views of Lake County's own volcano, Mount Konocti.
Mount Konocti presides over Clear Lake at 4,305 feet and sits amongst volcanic cones and domes that are in the range of 10,000 to more than 2 million years old.
Mighty Mount Konocti's last eruption was approximately 11,000 years ago, with the first eruption having taken place about 350,000 years ago.
The mountain's namesake comes from the Pomo Indian word, “kno” or “mountain,” and combines it with the word, “htai” for “woman.”
Sitting on a bench in Austin Park along the mirror-like shore of our state's largest lake is a real treat for birdwatchers.
Our lake provides hearth and home to about 300 species of birds. Grebes, American White pelicans, eagles, egrets, mergansers and herons are only a scant few of the avian species which abound here.
The lake begins to work its magic with a jubilee of color, form and movement – a Calder composition.
Lake-watching can leave you transfixed by the pattern-play on its waters.
Unlike the metaphor used for time flowing like a river, a lake, according to Professor Dave Edmunds, “Time as a river is a more Euro-American concept of time, with each event happening and passing on like a river flows downstream. Time as a pond is a more Native American concept of time, with everything happening on the same surface, in the same areas – and each event is a ripple on the surface.”
Kathleen Scavone, M.A., is an educator, potter, writer and author of “Anderson Marsh State Historic Park: A Walking History, Prehistory, Flora, and Fauna Tour of a California State Park” and “Native Americans of Lake County.” She also writes for NASA and JPL as one of their “Solar System Ambassadors.” She was selected “Lake County Teacher of the Year, 1998-99” by the Lake County Office of Education, and chosen as one of 10 state finalists the same year by the California Department of Education.