As of July 2018, there are 60 true National Parks in the United States. Not properties managed by the National Park Service like National Monuments or National Historical Parks or something like that; I mean real full unqualified National Parks. Some folks, I imagine, are out to see them all. If they are, they better spend a lot of time in Alaska, which has eight of the 60.
My own National track record is not that stellar. In my first 45 years on this planet, I'd logged a grand total of nine. I can give myself a little bit of a pass on this one since I spent my first 11 years in a complete other country, but I feel there was more than enough time to see double digits National Parks after I moved here in 1979. When I started writing this blog, I didn't think much about boosting my Parks total, although I have (I've added ten since I turned 45). But if I'd thought at that time about where I'd like to go in the future I would probably have rolled out Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, Crater Lake in Oregon and Yosemite in California.
Last year, I made it to Carlsbad Caverns. I took the easy way (the elevator) down to the caves and then took the hard way (my two feet) out. Last month, I added Crater Lake to my parks visited list.
My own National track record is not that stellar. In my first 45 years on this planet, I'd logged a grand total of nine. I can give myself a little bit of a pass on this one since I spent my first 11 years in a complete other country, but I feel there was more than enough time to see double digits National Parks after I moved here in 1979. When I started writing this blog, I didn't think much about boosting my Parks total, although I have (I've added ten since I turned 45). But if I'd thought at that time about where I'd like to go in the future I would probably have rolled out Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, Crater Lake in Oregon and Yosemite in California.
Last year, I made it to Carlsbad Caverns. I took the easy way (the elevator) down to the caves and then took the hard way (my two feet) out. Last month, I added Crater Lake to my parks visited list.
Crater Lake National Park sits towards the southern end of the Cascades, a mountain range that extends all the way from northern California in the south to just over the Canadian border into British Columbia. The mountains form part of the Pacific Ocean's Ring of Fire, a belt of volcanoes that stretches all the way from the tip of Chile up north to the Bering Sea and back down the globe again to New Zealand.
This Ring of Fire thing sounds scary and it really pretty much is: most (like 80-90%) of the largest volcanic eruptions over the last 12,000 years or so on this planet have occurred in the Ring of Fire. Here at home in the continental United States, the only volcanic eruptions in the last 200 years have been in the Ring of Fire. And they have both been in the Cascades. Those would be the 1914 through 1921 explosions that rocked Lassen Peak in northern California and the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington.
As a mountain range, the Cascades are pretty impressive. They boast two 14ers, or mountains over 14,000 feet at their tops, in Washington state's Mount Rainier (14,411 feet) and Mount Shasta in California (14,180 feet) as well as one (Washington's Mount Adams) topping out at more than 12,000. They used to have a second 12,000 foot mountain in Mount Mazama, but in 2018 that peak sits at just a little over 8,150. So what happened to Mount Mazama?
Well, about 7,700 years ago or so, Mount Mazama, which coincidentally sits right about where Crater Lake is now, started to develop a problem. Down beneath the belly of the mountain, an underground lake of lava was forming. As this lake bubbled away, it generated expanding gas that ultimately needed to find a way out to the surface of the Earth. It was only really a matter of when, not if, Mazama would erupt.
Sure enough, that's exactly what happened and when the eruption occurred, the gas escaped any way it could. Some of the explosion blew pumice and ash out the top of the mountain but the gas made its way out in other vents and fissures further down Mazama, more or less perforating the surface of the peak in a circular pattern. The main explosion was massive by the way. It is estimated that there was enough ash discharged to cover the entire state of Oregon with a layer 8" in depth. If you can remember the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens, this one was likely 40 times as powerful.
What happens to a mountain that finds itself shredded by escaping gas and sitting on top of a void that used to be filled with molten rock? Well, in the case of Mount Mazama, it collapsed in on itself, losing a mile or so of height and leaving a crater about a mile deep and five miles across. Goodbye Mount Mazama; hello, Crater Lake!
Now, the Lake didn't exactly appear instantly once Mount Mazama had collapsed. Sure the shape of the bowl was pretty much taken care of but there was no water. The Lake would fill over the next few centuries (yes, centuries!). Hey, it takes a while to fill a hole with five trillion gallons of water even in a place with an average annual snowfall of 533 inches. Remember, there are no rivers flowing into this part of the world; just moments before its creation there was a mountain in the exact same spot. Fortunately for us, the crater was mostly watertight, which I find amazing.
The Lake today is fully filled. It leaks, but only enough to keep the water level stable. It is the deepest lake in the United States. It's also the clearest, the result of all the water coming from rain and snowmelt. There are no rivers dumping running water into it and there are almost no creatures in there to make any waves or stir up silt at the bottom. There are fish in the lake by the way. How do fish get into a lake caused by a collapsed volcano? Let's come back to that.
Oh, and by the way, it's absolutely gorgeous. The water is about the deepest, clearest blue color you can imagine and the air is clear and the place is pretty well isolated so there's just about no noise or light pollution or anything to take your attention away from the Lake. It really is a spectacular sight.
Want to go? Get ready for a drive. Being pretty much in the middle of nowhere takes a while to get there. We drove up from Redding, California and it took us about four hours. From Portland, it's probably a little more than that and from Eugene let's figure two to two and a half hours. There's a pretty good series of roads and interstate highways to the north and south where you can move along a pretty good clip, but get close to the park and you'll start to slow down as the roads become smaller and twistier and generally without guardrails.
Want to stay near or in the Park? Sure you do! The historic Crater Lake Lodge is right on the rim of the Lake and there are a few campsites and cabins inside the Park's boundaries. If you don't want to stay inside the Park or don't book early enough, you might be driving a while to get in and out. The nearest true hotel or motel is a 30 mile drive to the north and east in Chemult.
Can't plan ahead or thinking of showing up in the off season to avoid the rush? There is no off season. Off season is winter. And it lasts some years from early September to early July. In those extended winters, you can't even get to the lake in a car because the roads are closed under feet and feet of snow. Can't imagine what 533 inches of snow looks like? Check out the height of the poles on either side of the road in the photograph below. Those sticks mark the edges of the roads for plows. They are maybe 12 to 15 feet high each. It snows a lot in the mountains!
We timed our visit for the last week of June, right about the time the boats start taking folks for rides on the Lake if it's not still extended winter at Crater Lake. We figured a little hiking, a boat ride, maybe a bear or elk encounter from afar (or even better yet from the car) and a nice couple of evenings chilling at the Crater Lake Lodge with a beer or two looking at the Lake before hitting the sack for a very quiet night. Yeah, some of it worked out that way, but not entirely.
There was for sure hiking. Plenty of hiking. You could spend days hiking if that's your thing. We went walking through the woods and to some waterfalls and to see the strange rock formations called The Pinnacles and up towards one of the higher peaks around the Lake (note I said up towards, not up to the top of). We also hiked to the edge of the Lake. Before I got to the Park, I didn't know you could swim in the Lake; if I had I might have taken some trunks with me and taken a plunge.
There was also some sitting lakeside with beers. The Lodge has a fantastic extended front porch with rocking chairs and drink and food service. It is sort of romantic looking out over the water while sipping a beer watching the sun set to the west and realizing that it's way colder in the mountains than it was in the Napa Valley where you were just a couple of days before. Bring warm clothes, even in summer.
But the boat ride? And the wildlife spotting? Well, not so much. We get lucky so often on our trips to wherever we go so it's difficult to complain too much but I guess you could say our luck abandoned us at Crater Lake a little. There are bear and elk and porcupines and mountain lions in the Park. We didn't see any of those. We did see some marmots and a few Clark's nutcrackers and one or two (surprise! it's not a chipmunk) golden-mantled ground squirrels. I'd never seen these animals in the wild before. Now I have.
I get the wildlife being shy. We're not in a zoo. The fact that the animals can go where they please (including places we can't) is both a blessing and a curse. It's wonderful to see creatures free in their natural environment but a little disappointing when they don't come out and show themselves. But the boats not working? That was a little more than disappointing.
Yep, the boats were not working. None of them. Both broken. Mechanical difficulty. I came all the way across the country to take a ride on Crater Lake in a boat and nothing. We were told the news just about the moment we walked into the Steel Visitor Center on the south drive in a very cheery way. No apologies. No sympathy. Just they are not working. Have a nice day!
Killer!
Enough complaining. Probably. There were some highlights. I swear.
In the summer months when it's not extended winter, you can drive all around the perimeter of the Lake on the East and West Rim Drives. It's about a 33 mile or so long loop. Along the way there are spots to hike, picnic or just get out and gaze at the still, blue water and the coniferous forests of the Cascades that are all around you when you get out of sight of the Lake. It's worth making the complete drive. The Lake changes as you move around it and if you've gone all that way, you may as well get as much looking at it in before you leave.
There are two islands in the Lake itself, one (Wizard Island) big enough for a little mini-hike (if the boats are working, that is) and one not so much bigger than a large boat or ship (hence the Phantom Ship name given to it). Wizard Island (which was actually formed by a later eruption after the collapse of Mount Mazama) is visible on most of the drive. Phantom Ship is not; make sure you stop at the right spots.
One of the more fascinating stops we made was at Cloudcap Overlook on the east side of the rim. There we found a stand of flag trees, so named because their branches are all on one side of the trunk, as if they are a series of mini flags blowing stiff in the breeze. That is, in fact, exactly what happened to these trees. The wind is so fierce in winter in that area of the Park that the trees are blown to grow in just one direction; literally all the branches are growing on the east side of the tree which is the direction the wind blows in the colder months.
Hikes are funny things sometimes. Walking from one spot to another and then back to where you started is sometimes an odd thing to do. Every once in a while you'll do or see nothing that merits the kind of effort you made to make it there and back again. The one hike we made that clearly didn't fall into this category was the Cleetwood Cove Trail, which is the only path that leads down into the bowl of the old volcano to the surface of the Lake.
The Park warns you quite explicitly that the Cleetwood Cove Trail is a "strenuous hike" and the numbers are sure to scare off some folks. A little more than a mile each way on a path that looks like it's about almost straight down in some spots with a total change in elevation of 700 feet. That's like walking up the stairs in a 65 or 70 story building, only with more walking. But it's the only way down to the Lake. We had to go. And it was totally worth it despite the lack of board-able powered craft at the bottom to get us an up close and personal look at Wizard Island, the Phantom Ship and the walls of the collapsed crater.
The way down is pretty easy. The reflections and pollen patterns on the still water were fascinating on the descent, especially since the closer you got to the bottom of the slopes, the deeper you could see into the water. It really is super clear. I also appreciated the reward of dipping my hands into the water and getting a different perspective on what it's like from the bottom of the bowl. This is not necessarily some life-changing experience. Every once in a while it's good to slow down for 24 hours, even if 24 hours is about all I can stand slowed down at any one time.
The trek back up? No fascinating patterns. No watching the (again, inoperable) boats getting closer. No cool reward at the end of the walk. Just targeting the next pocket of shade and taking it slow. Really slow. In the end, we got right back to where we started and richer for the experience. Strenuous? OK, I can see it but I think it's erring on the side of caution on the Park's part. The Lake is a draw and walking down this one trail is the only way down. I'm sure the Park wants to make sure they scare some folks off who might need an emergency rescue. After all, nobody wants that.
Our stay at Crater Lake was intended to be two nights long. But perhaps in a sign that this particular National Park really wasn't meant for us (as if the boats not running wasn't enough and I promise that's the last time I'll mention that; probably) and after we spent about an hour or so recuperating (with a beer or two) from a day of hiking, the Lodge lost their water. No, the Lake didn't drain, but there was no running water when we were ready to shower. No running water also means no toilets and no dinner service. With a blessing from the Lodge and a bill for $1 for our second night in hand, we high-tailed it out of there and ended up in Eugene for the night. Done. And done.
If it seems like I've spent most of this post complaining, I apologize. My primary memories of Crater Lake will forever be focused on the water and how gorgeously peaceful it was. I hope the few pictures in this post demonstrate what a beautiful place it is. Unfortunately for me, I'll probably never ride a boat around the shoreline or swim the 55-65 degree water in my life. The second of those is my fault.
One of the things that makes Crater Lake so special is its remoteness and unfortunately, that's probably the same thing that's going to keep me away from it probably forever. And I'm really OK with that. I'm glad I came and saw it. I got some good memories out of our 24 or so hours there and I slowed down for a day, which is sometimes worth something. Now all I need to do is figure out when I'm going to visit Yosemite. Might be a while.
Finally, I need to keep a promise I made earlier in this post. There are fish living in the Lake. Salmon and trout actually. How did they get there? Why, of course, man put them there so they could fish in the Lake. The problem? There's nothing for the fish to eat. So they also added some crawfish, which are now destroying the natrual ecosystem of the Lake. So we are now spending money to eradicate the crawfish. Will we ever learn?
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| Mount Shasta seen from the side of I-5 on the way to Oregon. |
Well, about 7,700 years ago or so, Mount Mazama, which coincidentally sits right about where Crater Lake is now, started to develop a problem. Down beneath the belly of the mountain, an underground lake of lava was forming. As this lake bubbled away, it generated expanding gas that ultimately needed to find a way out to the surface of the Earth. It was only really a matter of when, not if, Mazama would erupt.
Sure enough, that's exactly what happened and when the eruption occurred, the gas escaped any way it could. Some of the explosion blew pumice and ash out the top of the mountain but the gas made its way out in other vents and fissures further down Mazama, more or less perforating the surface of the peak in a circular pattern. The main explosion was massive by the way. It is estimated that there was enough ash discharged to cover the entire state of Oregon with a layer 8" in depth. If you can remember the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens, this one was likely 40 times as powerful.
What happens to a mountain that finds itself shredded by escaping gas and sitting on top of a void that used to be filled with molten rock? Well, in the case of Mount Mazama, it collapsed in on itself, losing a mile or so of height and leaving a crater about a mile deep and five miles across. Goodbye Mount Mazama; hello, Crater Lake!
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| The obligatory national park panorama shot from the iPhone. Had to do it. |
The Lake today is fully filled. It leaks, but only enough to keep the water level stable. It is the deepest lake in the United States. It's also the clearest, the result of all the water coming from rain and snowmelt. There are no rivers dumping running water into it and there are almost no creatures in there to make any waves or stir up silt at the bottom. There are fish in the lake by the way. How do fish get into a lake caused by a collapsed volcano? Let's come back to that.
Oh, and by the way, it's absolutely gorgeous. The water is about the deepest, clearest blue color you can imagine and the air is clear and the place is pretty well isolated so there's just about no noise or light pollution or anything to take your attention away from the Lake. It really is a spectacular sight.
Want to go? Get ready for a drive. Being pretty much in the middle of nowhere takes a while to get there. We drove up from Redding, California and it took us about four hours. From Portland, it's probably a little more than that and from Eugene let's figure two to two and a half hours. There's a pretty good series of roads and interstate highways to the north and south where you can move along a pretty good clip, but get close to the park and you'll start to slow down as the roads become smaller and twistier and generally without guardrails.
Want to stay near or in the Park? Sure you do! The historic Crater Lake Lodge is right on the rim of the Lake and there are a few campsites and cabins inside the Park's boundaries. If you don't want to stay inside the Park or don't book early enough, you might be driving a while to get in and out. The nearest true hotel or motel is a 30 mile drive to the north and east in Chemult.
Can't plan ahead or thinking of showing up in the off season to avoid the rush? There is no off season. Off season is winter. And it lasts some years from early September to early July. In those extended winters, you can't even get to the lake in a car because the roads are closed under feet and feet of snow. Can't imagine what 533 inches of snow looks like? Check out the height of the poles on either side of the road in the photograph below. Those sticks mark the edges of the roads for plows. They are maybe 12 to 15 feet high each. It snows a lot in the mountains!
We timed our visit for the last week of June, right about the time the boats start taking folks for rides on the Lake if it's not still extended winter at Crater Lake. We figured a little hiking, a boat ride, maybe a bear or elk encounter from afar (or even better yet from the car) and a nice couple of evenings chilling at the Crater Lake Lodge with a beer or two looking at the Lake before hitting the sack for a very quiet night. Yeah, some of it worked out that way, but not entirely.
There was for sure hiking. Plenty of hiking. You could spend days hiking if that's your thing. We went walking through the woods and to some waterfalls and to see the strange rock formations called The Pinnacles and up towards one of the higher peaks around the Lake (note I said up towards, not up to the top of). We also hiked to the edge of the Lake. Before I got to the Park, I didn't know you could swim in the Lake; if I had I might have taken some trunks with me and taken a plunge.
There was also some sitting lakeside with beers. The Lodge has a fantastic extended front porch with rocking chairs and drink and food service. It is sort of romantic looking out over the water while sipping a beer watching the sun set to the west and realizing that it's way colder in the mountains than it was in the Napa Valley where you were just a couple of days before. Bring warm clothes, even in summer.
But the boat ride? And the wildlife spotting? Well, not so much. We get lucky so often on our trips to wherever we go so it's difficult to complain too much but I guess you could say our luck abandoned us at Crater Lake a little. There are bear and elk and porcupines and mountain lions in the Park. We didn't see any of those. We did see some marmots and a few Clark's nutcrackers and one or two (surprise! it's not a chipmunk) golden-mantled ground squirrels. I'd never seen these animals in the wild before. Now I have.
I get the wildlife being shy. We're not in a zoo. The fact that the animals can go where they please (including places we can't) is both a blessing and a curse. It's wonderful to see creatures free in their natural environment but a little disappointing when they don't come out and show themselves. But the boats not working? That was a little more than disappointing.
Yep, the boats were not working. None of them. Both broken. Mechanical difficulty. I came all the way across the country to take a ride on Crater Lake in a boat and nothing. We were told the news just about the moment we walked into the Steel Visitor Center on the south drive in a very cheery way. No apologies. No sympathy. Just they are not working. Have a nice day!
Killer!
 |
| Marmot. Nutcracker. Ground squirrel. |
In the summer months when it's not extended winter, you can drive all around the perimeter of the Lake on the East and West Rim Drives. It's about a 33 mile or so long loop. Along the way there are spots to hike, picnic or just get out and gaze at the still, blue water and the coniferous forests of the Cascades that are all around you when you get out of sight of the Lake. It's worth making the complete drive. The Lake changes as you move around it and if you've gone all that way, you may as well get as much looking at it in before you leave.
There are two islands in the Lake itself, one (Wizard Island) big enough for a little mini-hike (if the boats are working, that is) and one not so much bigger than a large boat or ship (hence the Phantom Ship name given to it). Wizard Island (which was actually formed by a later eruption after the collapse of Mount Mazama) is visible on most of the drive. Phantom Ship is not; make sure you stop at the right spots.
One of the more fascinating stops we made was at Cloudcap Overlook on the east side of the rim. There we found a stand of flag trees, so named because their branches are all on one side of the trunk, as if they are a series of mini flags blowing stiff in the breeze. That is, in fact, exactly what happened to these trees. The wind is so fierce in winter in that area of the Park that the trees are blown to grow in just one direction; literally all the branches are growing on the east side of the tree which is the direction the wind blows in the colder months.
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| Scenes from Rim Drive: Wizard Island... |
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| Phantom Ship... |
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| and a stand of flag trees. Finally a picture without the Lake in it! |
The Park warns you quite explicitly that the Cleetwood Cove Trail is a "strenuous hike" and the numbers are sure to scare off some folks. A little more than a mile each way on a path that looks like it's about almost straight down in some spots with a total change in elevation of 700 feet. That's like walking up the stairs in a 65 or 70 story building, only with more walking. But it's the only way down to the Lake. We had to go. And it was totally worth it despite the lack of board-able powered craft at the bottom to get us an up close and personal look at Wizard Island, the Phantom Ship and the walls of the collapsed crater.
The way down is pretty easy. The reflections and pollen patterns on the still water were fascinating on the descent, especially since the closer you got to the bottom of the slopes, the deeper you could see into the water. It really is super clear. I also appreciated the reward of dipping my hands into the water and getting a different perspective on what it's like from the bottom of the bowl. This is not necessarily some life-changing experience. Every once in a while it's good to slow down for 24 hours, even if 24 hours is about all I can stand slowed down at any one time.
The trek back up? No fascinating patterns. No watching the (again, inoperable) boats getting closer. No cool reward at the end of the walk. Just targeting the next pocket of shade and taking it slow. Really slow. In the end, we got right back to where we started and richer for the experience. Strenuous? OK, I can see it but I think it's erring on the side of caution on the Park's part. The Lake is a draw and walking down this one trail is the only way down. I'm sure the Park wants to make sure they scare some folks off who might need an emergency rescue. After all, nobody wants that.
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| Scenes from the bottom: I love how perfect or near-perfect all the reflections are in the photographs... |
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| and how much you can see beneath the surface, at least to a certain depth. |
If it seems like I've spent most of this post complaining, I apologize. My primary memories of Crater Lake will forever be focused on the water and how gorgeously peaceful it was. I hope the few pictures in this post demonstrate what a beautiful place it is. Unfortunately for me, I'll probably never ride a boat around the shoreline or swim the 55-65 degree water in my life. The second of those is my fault.
One of the things that makes Crater Lake so special is its remoteness and unfortunately, that's probably the same thing that's going to keep me away from it probably forever. And I'm really OK with that. I'm glad I came and saw it. I got some good memories out of our 24 or so hours there and I slowed down for a day, which is sometimes worth something. Now all I need to do is figure out when I'm going to visit Yosemite. Might be a while.
Finally, I need to keep a promise I made earlier in this post. There are fish living in the Lake. Salmon and trout actually. How did they get there? Why, of course, man put them there so they could fish in the Lake. The problem? There's nothing for the fish to eat. So they also added some crawfish, which are now destroying the natrual ecosystem of the Lake. So we are now spending money to eradicate the crawfish. Will we ever learn?
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| Plaikni Falls. Worth the mile hike. |
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| The Pinnacles at the southeast corner of the Park. |
How We Did It
Crater Lake National Park is open 24 hours a day, every day of the year. But depending on where you are coming from, it may be a little complicated to get to.
There are two entrances to the Park: one from the north and one from the south. The south entrance is open year-round and road crews work throughout the winter to keep the roads to the Park Headquarters passable. However, the Park Headquarters is not at the Lake; it's at the intersection where the south entrance meets Rim Drive. Under most conditions, the road to Rim Village (which is at the Lake) will be open but the rest of Rim Drive, which is pretty much 95% of the loop, and the north entrance, are closed in winter due to snow.
As I hope I've made clear, winter at Crater Lake is not like winter where most of us live. Rim Drive has opened as late as July 13 just last year (2017, in case you are reading this in 2019 or beyond). Check the Park website or call for more information if you are planning a visit. We got to Crater Lake on June 25 this year and we got lucky because they had a mild winter. Like just 29 feet of snow mild.
There is only one hotel in the Park, the Crater Lake Lodge. This place fills up. We booked 53 weeks in advance and the lakeview rooms were sold out. Plan early if you want to stay in the Park. If there's some good news for people who don't like planning that far ahead, our reservation when we made it was fully refundable up to 48 hours ahead of the date of our stay. So if you think you want to go, you can always make a reservation and then cancel later on. Just check the terms when you make the reservation in case they ever change them up. Reservations can be made through the Park website.
Boat tours (when the boats are operable) are sometimes available to book in advance. At the beginning of the season (like the days we went), it's first come, first served. I can't comment on how quickly the boats fill up and the wisdom of showing up without a reservation for reasons which I hope are obvious to you if you've read this entire post. Reservations for the boats, just like lodging, can be made through the Park website.
There are two entrances to the Park: one from the north and one from the south. The south entrance is open year-round and road crews work throughout the winter to keep the roads to the Park Headquarters passable. However, the Park Headquarters is not at the Lake; it's at the intersection where the south entrance meets Rim Drive. Under most conditions, the road to Rim Village (which is at the Lake) will be open but the rest of Rim Drive, which is pretty much 95% of the loop, and the north entrance, are closed in winter due to snow.
As I hope I've made clear, winter at Crater Lake is not like winter where most of us live. Rim Drive has opened as late as July 13 just last year (2017, in case you are reading this in 2019 or beyond). Check the Park website or call for more information if you are planning a visit. We got to Crater Lake on June 25 this year and we got lucky because they had a mild winter. Like just 29 feet of snow mild.
There is only one hotel in the Park, the Crater Lake Lodge. This place fills up. We booked 53 weeks in advance and the lakeview rooms were sold out. Plan early if you want to stay in the Park. If there's some good news for people who don't like planning that far ahead, our reservation when we made it was fully refundable up to 48 hours ahead of the date of our stay. So if you think you want to go, you can always make a reservation and then cancel later on. Just check the terms when you make the reservation in case they ever change them up. Reservations can be made through the Park website.
Boat tours (when the boats are operable) are sometimes available to book in advance. At the beginning of the season (like the days we went), it's first come, first served. I can't comment on how quickly the boats fill up and the wisdom of showing up without a reservation for reasons which I hope are obvious to you if you've read this entire post. Reservations for the boats, just like lodging, can be made through the Park website.
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