On Our Way to California

Odus and Joanne had two of their grandkids that week.

These is the other couple that we had met 3 years ago on the west coast. This is Odus and Joanne Howard. Odus and Joanne and Harrell and Sandy have traveled together for many years and they are good friends. When we met them the first time, we met them at Leavenworth, WA and again at La Conner, WA, Seaside, Whaler's Rest, South Jetty, OR and Isleton, CA. We had a good time at that time and we went and saw them crabbing. That was good crabs.

I guess this RV has seen better times.

Some more barns.

When we came out of the park to go to town, these guys from a prison unit were working on the road.

These are our friends Harrell and Sandy Robbins from CA.

This is our campsite and our friend's. Most of the time we were here we were working on something. At Redding, CA we thought we would stay at a Walmart but when we got there, we found out it was a smaller Walmart and there was no room for anything. After trying to get out of there and on a turn, our Monico mud flap fell off. I guess we had run over some pieces of tires that the 18 wheelers leave on the road and somehow we probably dragged it a long way together with our mud flap. When we got to Walmart we discovered that it was totally destroyed. It was covered in oil and all the rubber from where it attached to the flap frame was all chewed off. We kind of redid it and put it back up but we don't know if it's going to work. We played games every night outside so that is why this lamp is there. We had fun.

I thought this was a cute little house on top of a hill just outside the park.

An then we saw some wild turkeys. There were probably about 12 to 14 in all.

First thing we saw when we entered the park.

After a long rinky dinky road we got to TT Lake of the Springs Park. We are suppose to meet with 2 couples that we met three years ago on the west coast.

We stopped here at Chico because Tommy noticed that we were leaking oil. We unhooked and found a Walmart and found some synthetic oil. We bought 6 gallons but only put in 2.

This was a pretty long bridge.

We didn't know what these colorful things were until we got closer. They are all bright colored water trucks. I'd never seen trucks in those colors but maybe Californian people have.

Mount Shasta.

Stopped here for a few minutes to check everything out.

Mount Shasta in California.

We stopped here for a minute just to let them know that we didn't have any fruits or vegetables or whatever. I guess it was an inspection station.

Another one of them barns.

These were advertising signs at Dorris CA which was really neat cuz it looked like a flag from a distance. Of course when I was trying to get the picture I didn't get the whole thing. They had one of them flags at the entrance and another one at the exit of the little town. I didn't get that one either.

We just crossed over into California from Oregon.

We heading to Klamath Falls here. We thought we were going to spend the night but we kept on trucking into California.

Crater Lake - Oregon

This is where we were parked. Remember I told you we were going to come back and were going to eat, play a little and spend the night here at the casino. Well, that didn't happen. When we came back it was still early so Tommy decided we should go on, so we did. Tommy just doesn't like casinos, it's not like I'm a big gambler. Oh Well!!!!

So here we are, back at the casino where we left our coach.

Maybe the mother was in there also.

There's a few baby birds in the next.

I don't know how Tommy saw this bird and nest on top of this electrical post. I don't know what kind of bird it is. It sure is a big nest. I'd never seen one that big.

We stopped here on the way to take some pictures of an old military post.

We even saw a river on the way that was named after us.

I hope that you enjoyed this. We did and the information that I wrote is nothing to really let you see the magnificence of this experience.

On our way out of the park.

Another view.

Can you see those things on the side of this island? We couldn't.

This is something on the edge of Wizard Island. On the lake the island doesn't look to be very far but it is. Those things are just little bitty specks that we tried to zoom in. It looks like it might be boat docks and storage.

Crater Lake is the deepest lake in the United States, the second deepest in the Western Hemisphere, and the seventh deepest in the world.

The Visitor Center.

This is what the lake looks like in a smaller scale. The rim drive that encircles the lake is 33 miles. There are more than 30 scenic pullouts along the route, many which have roadside exhibits.

Nestled against the southeastern shore, Crater Lake's "other island" escapes detection by many park visitors. Though it resembles a small pirate ship, the island is as tall as a 16-story building. It's made of erosion-resistant rock, 400,000 years old-the oldest exposed rock within the caldera.

The beauty of the lake is so overwhelming with its deep blue color.

The water is exceptional for its clarity and intense blue color and it is considered to be the cleanest and puriest large body of water in the world.

There are no streams that run into or out of the lake so it is considered a closed ecological system. Why is the water so Blue? Light gets absorbed color by color as it passes through clear water. First the reds go, then orange, yellow and green. Last to be absorbed are the blues. Only the deepest blue gets scattered back to the surface where you see it as the color of the water. The water is of course no more blue than the sky is blue.

This is Wizard Island which was formed after later eruptions. Wizard Island's elevation is 6,940 feet and the height above the water is 767 feet. The lake surface elevation is 6,173 feet.

This is part of Crater Lake. There is no way that anybody can take a picture of the whole magnitude of the lake except from the air. It is a hugh bowl-shaped caldera. At first the caldera's floor was too hot to hold water. Renewed volcanism sealed the caldera and built the Wizard Island. The lake is 1,943 feet deep, 4.5 to 6 miles wide. It has an annual snowfall of 44 feet and precipitation of 66 inches.

Mt. Manzama is the volcano that erupted and collapsed into itself to form Crater Lake 7,700 years ago. Later eruptions formed Wizard Island and other volcanic features, now hidden under the lake. Mt. Manzama began to grow half a million years ago. Humans have lived around the mountain for more than 10,000 years and probably witnessed its cataclysmic eruption. If you gathered up the ash from Mount Mazama's catastrophic eruption and spread it evenly across the state of Oregon, it would form a layer 8 inches thick. The ash from the eruptions lies scattered over eight states and three Canadian provinces. The eruption produced more than 150 times as much ash as did Mount St. Helens on May 18, 1980.

Entrance to the Park. Crater Lake has long played a significant role in the cultures of local American Indian tribes. In 1853 prospectors in search of gold found the lake and as word spread, people began visiting from all over the world. William Gladstone Steel first visited in 1885. Largely as a result of his efforts, Crater Lake became a national park on May 22, 1902.

A few waterfalls.

Huge craters along the way.

Along we go into the National Park.

This is the beginning of the National Park property. The size of the park is 183,224 acres.

We're finally on our way to Crater Lake.