Wednesday, August 31st.
We landed in Portland, Oregon around 1:30 pm. By the time we got our bags, picked up our rental car, and bought groceries at a super sketchy Walmart (I know, I know.. but it was the first thing we saw), it was almost dark. We still had 270 miles to drive before we arrived at Crater Lake National Park, which meant we had to set up camp at a cold, wet and completely dark campground. We love a good adventure story, though, so we thought, “bring it on!”.
It rained almost the whole way there. I remember sitting in the passenger seat with my feet on the dashboard, looking at a map and one of the National Parks books Jeff had purchased before the trip thinking, “What have we done?”. That’s all we had. Books. Two books. Two books that told us how much fun we were about to have, what sites we should see, what trails to take, and how to avoid the crowds. I was nervous and really excited. I’ve always considered myself an adventurer but not necessarily when it comes to the outdoors. I still scream when I see a spider and I still loath the taste of campfire food (besides s’mores, obviously), but I’m way better at camping/hiking/adventuring now. It took a little practice and a ‘fake it ’till you make it’ attitude, but by the end of this 10 day trip, I could at least contribute to the whole set up/break camp process. Anyway…
Jeff and I drove along a river and some railroad tracks for miles before we saw an old abandoned (hopefully) railroad car. We stopped to take a picture. The first attempt at a selfie with our new selfie stick totally failed. We were 100% certain it was broken. It would take us until our 8th park to figure out how to use it (eye roll).
Eventually, we made it to Crater Lake National Park. Before we could get to our campsite, we were stopped by a pace car. Apparently, they were doing a bit of construction on Rim Drive (a 33-mile scenic highway that circles the entire lake) and we had to wait almost 30 minutes before being lead through the park to a safe enough area where we could drive on our own again.
We stayed at the Mazama Village Campground (spot: E2). Aside from our site being pitch black and way colder than we anticipated, it was pretty perfect. We put on our headlamps and pitched our tent. Jeff got out our little MSR stove. He made chicken and freeze-dried mac n’ cheese. It was weird, but kind of good? The next morning in 32-degree weather, Jeff made bacon egg and cheese sandwiches and coffee. YUM! We broke camp and headed out for a hike.
Mount Scott was my first true summit and I have never felt more deserving of a beer in my life. The switchbacks on this hike were no joke. When we reached the summit, we sat for a minute, cracked open a cold one, made friends with a guy and his two pups (he had a flask of whiskey for himself and water for the doggies), and headed back down. Because of all the recent fires, we couldn’t actually see the lake, but I still felt accomplished, and I think Jeff did too ;).
We stopped at the visitor’s center on the way out to grab a few postcards, and of course a puzzle. We love puzzles. It is pretty safe to say we will go back to Crater Lake at some point in our lives, and maybe next time, we’ll even get to see it!
~Adventure is out there
Julia
