Leslie and David's Wanderings: 11 September 2019 Deep Blue Lake

Thursday, September 12, 2019

11 September 2019 Deep Blue Lake

The drive from Phoenix to Crater Lake National Park is roughly 1.5 hours on the

Rogue-Umpqua Scenic Byway (Oregon 62). We stopped at the visitor center to collect our 47th Passport Stamp,shopped in the gift store (David picked up his hat), watched the park film and then we talked with the rangers about trail options. We had Etta with us since it was going to be a long day, which limited our hiking options since we did not want to leave her in the truck for too long and we could not take her on any of the trails. We then drove the 33 mile Rim Road, stopping at most of the turnouts to absorb the spectacular scenery. This is a stunningly beautiful park. The lake water is so pure and incredibly blue. The lake contains over 5 trillion gallons of some of the purest water in the world. The lake was formed when the volcano collapsed into the magna chamber below it 7,700 years ago. The local Indian tribes have tales passed down through generations about the eruption and collapse. The lake is filled with rain and snow melt (Over 44 feet of snow every year). It’s the deepest lake in North America. There are no river/creeks that flow into the lake. There are no outflow rivers/creeks. The lake maintains it level via evaporation (18 billion gallons per year) and seepage (15 billion gallons per year). After working our way around most of the Rim Road, we took the side road to the Pinnacles trailhead. There are formations off this trail that were developed by hot gas seeping up through volcanic pumas which melted and hardened the pumas so that it did not erode like the pumas around it leaving the pinnacles. We hiked the short trail (.7 miles, 62 feet of elevation gain, 148 calories). We then made our way to the deck off the Crater Lake Lodge and sat back in the rocking chairs and enjoyed an adult beverage while soaking in the stunning views. We would have loved to sit on the deck and waited for sunset, but Etta was already squirming for her dinner. So we had to head back to the Wanderer. We really need to come back here and stay in the lodge to see the lake at sunrise and sunset sometime in the future.