Day 9: Crater Lake, up, down, and all around plus a surprise

Well, at about 5:30 this morning, I heard a sound which I thought was Andy’s alarm. Turned out it was a crow outside! Steve went to the bathroom, and I tried to go back to sleep, but I just couldn’t. By the time he was back, I was changed and ready to start preparing for the day.

We got Andy and Emily up as quickly as we could and started packing up everything possible. We let Pete sleep as long as we possibly could, but finally, I had to wake him up. The poor guy. By the time he was awakened, everything, and I mean EVERYTHING was out of the tent but him and his sleeping bag! I’m glad he didn’t wake up on his own and think we had abandoned him!

We broke camp by 7:30. Steve and I were impressed that the kids got moving so quickly. We made it up to the camp store, got coffee, and headed up to the rim to make it to the check in point for our boat trip by 9. As we drove past the first turnout on Rim drive, we got our first look at Crater Lake. It is SO BEAUTIFUL!! The blue colors of the lake are stunning. They say it is the deepest lake in the US, and it is the most pure water in all of the world. Nothing but snowfall runoff goes into it, so it stays pure. Scientists have been able to see almost 600ft down which is a world record for clarity.

Anyway, we stopped and took a photo, and then headed over to the boat check in. We got our tickets, and then made the 700 ft. descent down to the boat dock. You literally walk from the rim, all the way down to the lake. Of course, going down to the boat was the easy part. We got down there with about 15 minutes to spare, so we stood around and just marveled at the water. We could see where the edges dropped off, and if you looked long enough, you could see fish in the water.

Sunscreen application is not Pete's favorite thing.

We all got on the boat and took off by 10am. It was a lovely ride with a Park Ranger giving us information about the crater and the original mountain (Mt. Mazama was 12,000 ft. high before it blew it’s top about 7,500 years ago and collapsed to what it is today). After the mountain collapsed, the magma continued to bubble up and created a small island within the lake called Wizard Island. The boat took us around to that island and dropped us off. It was about 10:30 and they said they’d be back around 1:30. So, we, along with about 20 other people, began to hike up to the top of the cone.

It was quite a trek going 600 ft up to the top, with plenty of rests for poor Peter who was still exhausted from his partial night of sleep! It was also very narrow, with an angled drop straight down. Having Pete walking with us frazzled my nerves, but the views were amazing! We finally made it to the top of the cone, found a shady spot and had our lunch. What a view for lunch! After that, we walked around the cone and then came back down the way we had come up. Not surprisingly, going down was a lot easier than going up.













Going up...yikes!

We made it to the top!!

Going back down. Yikes again!

Once we made it to the bottom, we went down to the dock and put our sad, tired feet in the water. It was a cool 60 degrees and felt GREAT! Some of the people in our group actually swam, but I was not interested in doing that. Emily thought about it for a moment, but just couldn’t bring herself to do it. If I’d had a wetsuit I might have. It would be amazing to swim and be able to see so far down, but I’m a chicken when it comes to cold water.


The boat picked us up around 1:45, and we finished the tour of the lake. They drove us around the entire circumference, explaining different natural features and answering questions about the lake. The sun, the rumble of the motor and the drone of the Ranger was too much for my boys. They were gone for awhile, which was a good thing. We were going to need our energy to hike back up those 700 ft to the parking lot when we got back!


We docked and I carried Pete off the boat. He awoke, but was quite groggy. I wondered how we were ever going to get him all the way up to the top. Between promises of ice cream, and a few times when Steve put him on his shoulders to carry him, he made it up. It was quite a trek. We stopped at Rim Village for the promised ice cream plus a few T-shirts before we headed towards Bend and our Yurt!

I had planned to leave Crater Lake earlier than we did (I didn’t know the boat ride would be quite so long), so we were headed for Bend about 1.5 hours later than I wanted to be. Bend was to be a place where we could regroup, shower, do laundry, buy more groceries, and have an early night since we were so dirty and tired. Well, about 30 minutes into our two hour drive Steve looks in the rear view mirror and says “There go our sleeping bags!”

We immediately pulled over and discovered that our Yakima rooftop carrier was wide open and we were missing a few things. I started running backwards down the highway. I could see two sleeping bags in the middle of the road still fully contained in their stuff sacks, plus one on the side which had exploded open. I was picking up the one on the side, when a pickup stopped in the middle of the road in front of one of the others and got out and picked it up. He drove up to me and told me he would circle back to get the one further down. I thanked him profusely and started back for the car.

By this time Steve had taken stock of what was missing. I was walking back toward the car with two bags, and the pickup man was driving up with the other bag he had retrieved, when a car pulled up in front of us with a mattress pad and Pete’s sleeping bag! They said that they had seen them fly out of our car just south of town (about 3 miles back). The woman said she had wondered what kind of jerry rigging we had on our Yakima until she got closer and thought “Oh, oops! That’s not supposed to be like that!” She also mentioned that she saw our tarp south of town, too, but we told her that was expendable.

(Sadly there are no photos of me running down the road to put in at this point!)

After everyone left, we took a final count of everything and realized that we were not only missing the tarp, but one mattress pad. We decided to double back and drive slowly starting on the south side of town to where we had stopped. Nothing. Steve said that it was probably gone, but I wanted to give it one more try. Perhaps it had flown out first, and so would be wherever the tarp was, and we hadn’t found the tarp yet. So we doubled back again but went further south than the first time. AND WE FOUND IT!!! I was so excited. Another 100 ft. forward and we found the tarp too. BONUS! We were so excited…and now so very very LATE.

We skipped seeing anything at Newberry National Volcanic Monument (sometimes you just have to let things go) and made our way slowly towards Bend (constantly checking on the closed Yakama through the sunroof!). We hit construction that apparently happens after 6pm, and it was 6:30. D’oh! Those thirty extra minutes cost us another 30 waiting to pass the construction. So, after all was said and done, we made it to our yurt at 7:30. We were dirty, hungry, tired but I still felt victorious over finding that last mattress pad.

We unloaded as much of the disheveled car as we could, and decided that it was late and we just needed to eat. I had found a place online called the Bend Brewing Company in downtown Bend, and it looked like just the place for us! The downtown area of Bend is quite a happening place (reminds me of the Lincoln Park area). We passed another option called the Pine Tavern, but it looked to fancy. Remember, we were still a dirty, dusty mess from our day on the lake. A Brewing Company seemed more appropriate than the upscale a Tavern.

We had a wonderful meal, and it was served quickly, which became even more important than the food at that point. After heading back to the yurt, it was showers and bed for everyone. I must say that the Yurt is a very nice way to go when you want to camp. You still need your sleeping bags (thank goodness we still had all five!), but they supply the mattresses and the structure. It was really nice not to have to set up the tent. We had to use the campground showers and bathrooms, but they were clean and close to the yurt.

What a day! Everyone is exhausted. Tomorrow we just drive all day to Wyoming, so I think we’ll recover quickly.

Note to Doric: I wanted to do this trip in three weeks, but the kids had to be back for Marching Band. Ugh! So, yes, we’ve been on quite the whirlwind tour, but there is just so much to see! I had warned the kids this was more like a sampling of the west and not a thorough exploration at any one place. This way they’ll know what they'd like to revisit and stay for a longer period of time. Go easy on Steve when he returns. He’s going to need a vacation after he gets back. ;-)