Crater Lake National Park
Trip Start
Jun 27, 2009
1
19
35
Trip End
Aug 07, 2009
Diamond Lake,
Oregon,
United States
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
As I may or may not have mentioned in previous journals, our trip to Crater Lake was a last minute add on. Crater Lake is located in Central/Southern Oregon in the Cascade Range. A little quick background on the National Park:
Mount Mazama is a volcano (now known as Crater Lake) that erupted approximately 6,500 years ago. When the eruption ended, the upper part of the volcano collapsed and sealed the magma vents and closed off the floor this new caldera. Over about 700 years this large area filled with water and is now a lake in the former volcano known as Crater Lake. It is about 7 miles wide and 6 miles long, and the depth of the water can range from 1100 feet to 1900 feet. What gives the water it's color is it’s purity from outside elements (no streams run into it) and an unusual makeup of sediment, many of which are volcanic in nature
CHIPMUNKS! YOU MUST WATCH THIS
. So now that your history lesson is over…..TAKE A LOOK AT THE PICTURES!! You drive around a ring road which spans the whole lake. When you first see it…you believe that you are dreaming! I can’t do enough justice here but I hope the photos will. By the way, the volcano still has some thermal activity at the base of the lake which leads scientists to believe that one day it may erupt again.
Also at the lake are the most AWESOME CHIPMUNKS. I have posted a video online…WATCH IT. Seriously if you do nothing else, please watch it.
After leaving Crater Lake Jen and I headed to a pizzeria near our campground (the pizza was 'eh’). Our campground was on the edge of Diamond Lake, a pretty area near the base of Crater Lake National Park. Now, the site was nice…firepit, good view, etc etc. However there were a lot of bugs and mosquitoes. They drove us crazy to the point that we actually went to bed early so as to escape the swarms of them (check out the picture).
Now…I forgot a cardinal rule: Where there are tons of bugs, there will be tons of spiders. When we awoke this morning….our tent was COVERED in spiders. Big, hairy spiders…small thin ones, gross ones. You name it, it was probably on our tent. Some had even built webs on the rain fly. It took us nearly an hour to get all of the spiders off. NOT PLEASANT.
That’s about where we leave off for today. Got my windshield fixed…and now it’s on to California!
