Crater Lake Nat’l Park & Hosmer Lake, Oregon – July 2021

Crater Lake National Park, OR

CHECK!  The first National Park of my journey has been checked off the list.  That was Crater Lake National Park in Oregon.  I know I saw Crater Lake as a kid during a family road trip, but I was young enough that it’s a vague memory.  It was fun to see it again and have those memories refreshed with new ones.  I shared the adventure with my friends Mike and Marie.  We had planned to stay at a campground between the Oregon coast and Crater Lake, however it and the highway were closed due to a forest fire in the area.  We had a hard time finding a campsite along our new route to Crater Lake so we opted to pull into a Sno-Park for the night.  Which turned into 4 nights. 

If you’re not aware, Sno-Parks are free to stay in during the non-winter months.  Many are just a big gravel parking lot, but this Walt Haring Sno-Park had vault toilets (spic n span), picnic tables, fire rings, and a dump station.  And it was paved. Bingo!  In retrospect it turned out to be a good thing as it gave us more time in the Crater Lake area to see more than just the lake.  After 4 nights at the Sno-Park we switched to a pre-reserved campground, Broken Arrow, on Diamond Lake just north of Crater Lake.  This was another fine campground at $15/night.  There were showers, potable water, and a dump station available by donation.

With so much time in the area, we were able to split up driving the Crater Lake Rim Road into two sections, West and East.  The two sides are quite different from each other.  The West side driving up to the Crater Lake lodge was open with vast meadows and clustered trees.  You could see forever!  The lodge area is where you’ll find food, gifts, restrooms, and TONS of people.  The views of the lake here are stunning.  The day we drove this side the air was fairly clear of smoke from forest fires in other areas, so the lake was deep blue ringed by the outer rim of the caldera.  In the middle sits
Wizard Island, the notable feature of Crater Lake.  This is the deepest lake in the United States. With no rivers running into or out of the caldera, the water is super clean since it is fed by snow and rain only.  The deep blue of the lake is due to the depth of the lake and lack of sediment.  There is a very large viewpoint at the lodge with paved paths running along the rim for incredible views from every angle.  It was a beautiful day!

Our second visit to the lake was for the EAST side of the rim drive.  What a difference!  The day started out fairly smokey (disappointing) but very calm with no wind which created perfect reflections of the caldera rim onto the lake surface.  During the day the wind picked up and blew away most of the smoke for another beautiful day!  This eastern side was surprisingly more green and lush with dense trees, wildflowers and occasional little waterfalls.  The views from this side were amazing!  Not better but completely different from the post card pictures you usually see.  Here you get to see ‘Phantom Ship’, a craggy mysterious looking little volcanic rock of an island poking up out of the water.  Considerably smaller than Wizard Island, it is much more picturesque.  A bonus on the eastern side is that people and cars are more spread out for a more relaxing experience. 

There are many options for hiking in this area if you are in good shape (we aren’t!).  On other days we chose day trips to other lakes and scenic drives in the area.  My last day, I was able to meet up with my good friends Anne & Lauren who were passing through on their way up to Washington.  We had a fantastic time getting caught up with each other even though we only had a couple of hours. 

Alas, it was time to part with all good friends and continue on my journey.

Hosmer Lake (Cascade Lakes Hwy) near Bend, OR

I stayed here for two nights at South Campground.  This Cascade Lakes scenic byway has alpine lakes all along the route with campgrounds at each one.  Some lakes are big and others small.  But all of them are a kayaker’s dream!  I’ve been in this area before but didn’t have time for Hosmer Lake which is said to be the best for canoers or kayakers.

Having only one full day at the lake, I spent about 3 hours kayaking.  There is a southern part of the lake very round and surrounded by reeds that the red-winged blackbirds use for nesting. The most exciting part of this paddle is the central and northern parts.  The central part is narrowish (like a channel) surrounded by tall reeds on both sides.  This winding channel eventually opens into the northern part of the lake with gorgeous vistas of Mt Bachelor, Broken Top Mtn and South Sister Mtn.  It’s mind blowing how gorgeous this area is.  There were little grassy islands every so often with water channels on all sides.  You could paddle in and out and around various groupings of reeds and tall grassy areas.  Another kayaker told me that you could paddle up the river inlet to a waterfall.  That sounded intriguing so off I went to the northern end of the lake and started up the river.  It was very shallow in some places and there were fallen tree limbs to dodge on the way up.  Paddle, paddle, paddle.  Paddle hard as the flow of the river works against you.  I finally made it to the furthest point where about 10 other people had pulled up on the bank.  Mind you, I am from Washington and have seen some fairly spectacular waterfalls.  This one?  Disappointing!  It was pretty just not the tall waterfall I was expecting.  Unless you call 6 feet tall!

Bonus… going back down the river is fast and effortless as the water pushes you along.  Well, until you get to the lake again. 😊   At this point I’m thinking, ‘My arms are really tired’ but I have to paddle all the way back down the lake to the campground.  I was envious of those people who had electric motors whizzing past me.  It was mid afternoon at this point and I saw a lot of ducks with tiny ducklings paddling along behind.  I reached one area where there were hundreds of small blue dragonflies careening about catching bugs.  Really beautiful!  One little blue dragonfly tried to fly up my nose, but I told him there was nothing in there for him! 

The only downside of this lake was the amount of people… canoers, fly fishermen, kayakers, paddle boarders.  As I passed a woman in a kayak she said it felt like a highway!  The word was out about Hosmer Lake!