Oregon: Crater Lake 🫶
Crater Lake National Park has been on Vince’s wish list most of his life. The nation’s deepest lake (1942ft), drinkable pure water with ~100ft visibility and it’s a volcano! Add 3 more smaller volcanos pushed up in the crater lake to make the bottom of the lake its own mountain range and that’s some pretty amazing geological history. The park is a forest of creeks and trees atop a flowing bed of volcanic rock. Combined with the lush National Forests (Umpqua, Fremont-Winama, De-shutes & Rougue Siskiyou) surrounding the park it’s the most densely wooded area we’ve seen on the trip. This outdoor paradise boasts waterfalls and wooded hikes galore! An added surprise was the amount of snow still sitting atop the mountain in mid-May. Crater Lake rim ranges from 7000-8000ft so we expected some snow but were shocked to see the snow piled to the roof tops of the park buildings and the roads lined with up to 10ft of snow. Research informed us that the lake rim sees an average of 50ft of snow per year so it’s coming down at 5-6ft when we climbed around, it’s the most snow we’ve seen on this trip. The volume of snow explains how the crater stays filled with such pristine water but it also kept most of the trails, rim drive and water access closed for our visit so it was limited view but… what a view! The south rim was worth the trip and the boys had their best snow play of the trip, on a volcano 😎
Discovery Point on the West Rim Drive
The drive in was deeper and deeper snow in May!
The Rim Visitor’s Center with snot to the rooftop. They had tunnels off the sides to get into the building.
To get a view of the lake you had to hike out across the snow and the boys made the best of it. Peyton went budget skiing… in his shoes.
Crater Lake from the Rim Visitor Center.
Gotta watch out for the snow plows Jayden.
Peyton napping with a view… oh and that is about 5 feet of snow under that tree. How do we know? Vince sunk up to his waist about 3ft to the left.
Wizard Island is actually a secondary volcano that rose from the collapsed original crater. It has a mini caldera on top but can’t quite see form this angle.
The snow was a bummer for getting around the rim but geez is it beautiful reflecting off the lake.
Ok this was to share that we don’t always get what we want… even in paradise. Crater Lake is a noted “black sky” location and a good location to see the Milky Way on a clear night… the night we went back up was not a clear night. There is a cloud sitting atop the lake and caldera. Visibility was about 50 feet. Still chasing that Milky Way view!
We also took in the local sights and hikes near Prospect, OR, which really were an amazing combination of volcanic gorges and sandstone cliffs flanking the Rogue River. Got some worship and fellowship at Trail Christian Fellowship and some local chainsaw art that kind of blew our minds 🤯
This is the Upper Rogue River running next to the Crater Lake RV Park. Michele is standing on volcanic rock lining the river. There were the occasional lava tube holding water along the river… pretty cool!
Same Upper Rogue River just past the North Fork Diversion Reservoir.
Tons of hikes through the tall pines! Most ended at a waterfall or cliff.
Upper mini water fall on the Pearsony Falls Trail. We almost stopped thinking this was the falls but another ½ mile through a less cleared trail and WOW were we glad we kept going.
Pearsony Falls… the big one :). Note if you’re ever in Prospect and take this hike the trail diminishes quickly at a 50ft cliff (top right of this picture) but you can follow a foot path along the cliff and take a switch back path down to the water.
On the Pearsony Falls Trail Vince noticed a few odd markings on a pine about 15-20 ft in the air and a bunch of related mulch at the bottom of the tree. After examining for a bit we think it’s bear clawing into the tree for bugs. Welcome any other thoughts on what it could be but pretty interesting.
View form Roger’s Point Gorge Lookout just past Prospect on Mill Creek Drive. It looks like a private drive but walk in about 20 yards and WOW.
Zoom in for a read this is a cool story about this scenic overlook and the realities of firefighting in Oregon!
Gorge Overlook above Pearsony Falls.
Pearsony Falls from Mill Creek Road.
Crater Lake RV Park has a resident chainsaw sculptor, Charles Wollertz. Pretty impressive. Zoom in but this is a tree stump that was carved down into an unbroken wooden chain link with a wooden ball cored out from the internal space of the stump, while still inside the stump. There was a second being constructed on another path as well as a turkey, mushrooms and few other items. Very impressive Charles!
Historic Union Creek Campground Rogue River, a long time stop for dignitaries and outdoorsmen heading west also boast Beckie’s Restaurant. Homemade pie is their specialty and we had some… twice :)
Few nibbles but no fish on this stop. Figured fishing the high side of the reservoir would be good but just took the bait and never landed anything. Not for a lack of effort!
Charlie loved the lava rock river’s edge. The small pools of rainwater and moss were his favorite.
Idola and Ann, thanks for a great lunch visiting after a wonderful service at Trail Christian Fellowship in Eagle Point. Fellowship with various churches across the country has been fun and this time we got a lunch too!
Great campfires under the pines and robust stars!
This was a surprise stop in Union Creek on the Rouge Gorge Trail. This walk highlights the Rogue River carving through the lava rock walls north of camp. You could see lava tubes, some channeling the water in/under the cliff wall and back out as the river chased through this gorge. Could have spent the day just listening to the power of the water rushing past these rocks.
Another walk through the pine forest but this time to some boulders…. specifically the Avenue of Giant Boulders Trail and the Barr and Mill Creek Waterfalls.
Barr Creek Water Fall, a 242 ft drop into the gorge.
Mill Creek Falls 173 ft
Avenue of the Giant Boulders was pretty cool.
Through the Avenue of the Giant Boulders you find the Rogue rushing past into the canyon.
Moren boulders in the Rogue but note the sandstone cliff across the river and the Pine leaning over the edge holding on by ½ its roots.
Made it back out from the 1.5 mile hike to the falls and boulders before sunset!
The drive north and around Crater Lake mountain also provided some unique opportunities. Michele got some more time behind the wheel of the RV and got to drive through a controlled burn 🔥 in a forest and a deer migration warning 😯 but fortunately and unfortunately we didn’t see the deer 🤪 lots of beautiful forest driving with snowcapped mountain peaks in the distance though!
Driving through the National Forests was a treat. The entire south, west and north sides of Crater Lake mountain are forest and Umpqua Reservation. Beautiful!
Mount Thielsen 9183 ft view from HW230
Michele was getting some more time behind the wheel and got concerned about this warning… unfortunately no deer were migrating at the moment we passed.
Michele was on fire driving :)
Forestry Service had a controlled burn right off the highway. We could feel the heat inside the RV with the windows closed. We saw tons of downed trees/branches gathered throughout the forests. We learned that these controlled burns help to lower wildfire spread. Crazy how much time and effort goes into this but also have a great appreciation for this kind of firefighting now.
