Lea and James' Excellent Adventure: Crater Lake

Our drive to Crater Lake was nice and easy. It was actually part of a conversation Lea and I had about longer drives. We knocked out four and a half hour drive like it was just another day, whereas, in the course of normalcy, I would never consider a four and a half hour drive easy.

The campgrounds in Crater Lake are by reservation only so we knew we didn’t have a reservation for the first night, but we did have a reservation for the second night we were planning on being there. We did some preliminary research on the surrounding National Forest lands and we identified Diamond Lake as a potential site for our camp. We drove straight there in attempts to secure a site. Diamond Lake is a massive campsite with over 180 sites, so the odds of us getting one were high. We pulled in and we were directed to the K and L loops. We drove through both of these loops and there were only three sites available; none of them interested us. As we were returning back to the front gatehouse, we noticed some vacant lots on another loop and as we talked with the ranger at the gate, she informed us that we could find an empty site in any of the loops, but most of them were reserved. We took a quick drive through the other loops and found them to be less than 25% filled so we claimed two adjacent lots, one for us and one for Alena. The first challenge was done!

After securing our sites for the evening, Lea and I proceeded into Crater Lake to hopefully talk with a ranger about good hikes for the following day. As with every park we visit this year, there is road construction and one-way roads which cause delays up to 20 minutes at a time. We eventually made it to the ranger station at 5:05 and they close up at 5:00. Oh well.

We decided to look over the map on our own and identify some hikes which really interested us. We planned on some shorter hikes, one to the top of Watchman’s Tower and one that went down to the lake. Both of these hikes were short, only about a mile long each, but there were difficult due to the angle of the terrain.

Lea and I drove around the ridge for a short stretch before we decided to head back to the camp and set everything up and cook some dinner before Alena arrived. As we set-up our camp we realized a major problem with the sites: mosquitoes. They were persistent, large, and out for blood! No amount of bug spray or campfire smoke deterred them so we just donned long sleeves and pants and settled in for a potentially miserable evening.

Alena eventually arrived at the site and we hung out for a while, sharing stories and enjoying the fire before we turned in for the evening. We all agreed to the plan for the next day and looked forward to the different areas we were going to explore.

We woke up, packed up camp, and were in Crater Lake by 10:00. We headed straight for the Watchman’s Tower because the parking lot is small and it seemed to fill up fast. The tower is an old fire watch station with views for hundreds of miles. It was from these vantage points that forest fires could be detected or monitored and then nearby people could be alerted. The views into the lake are remarkable and from any vantage point, it becomes clear how pure the water is. The lake water is a rich shade of blue which we hadn’t seen on this trip. We have seen cerulean blues in the prismatic springs of Yellowstone, incredible light blues in Glacier because of the pulverized rock, but this pristine deep rich blue was something else.

After climbing around the Watchman’s Tower for a little while we headed over to the Cleetwood Trail where they launch sightseeing boat tours of Crater Lake. These are the only watercraft allowed in the lake and they take 37 passengers out at a time. In the area surrounding where the boats launched are areas which are perfect for swimming. Each year Crater Lake receives over 500 inches of snow. Crater Lake is also close to 2000 feet deep so… the water is cold! Lea and I decided that there wasn’t much getting in the way of us swimming in Crater Lake and instead of slowly working our way in we decided to just jump off of the nearby cliff into the lake. The jump was between 15 and 20 feet and plunged right into the chilly waters. It was the only way to totally immerse yourself in the cooler water. Lea and I jumped off a couple of times before heading over to Alena and relaxed in the warming sun for a couple of minutes before we headed back up the caldera rim and out. The climb up was far more taxing than the way down and we would have enjoyed a swim post climb, but that was not the topography of the area.

For the rest of the afternoon, we circled around the caldera rim, enjoying the varying views of the lake, the phantom ship, and the famous Wizard Island which is the new volcanic cone rising up from the collapsed caldera.

We arrived back at the campsite and relaxed for a while. Last night had a beautiful, cloud-free sky with amazing views of the stars so I planned on taking some star pictures. In the evening I left the park and drove for a couple mile before I reached an open field where I choose to take the pictures of the stars. I am looking forward to the deserts of Utah for more opportunities to take pictures of the stars.