23 September 2016
There was ice on the jeep when I got up. I headed to Annie’s Creek Restaurant for breakfast and then, with good intentions, headed to Watchman Peak to hike the 1.6 mile up and back trail. They were repaving the west rim road and I had to be escorted via 1 lane to the pull off. When I got out of the car, it was 32F with a stiff wind, light rain and you could barely see the summit. I decided to wait for better weather.
I had to wait again to get back on the west rim road and traveled it until I started the return trip on the east rim road. There are several great overlooks on the east rim road and I took advantage of Cloudcap Overlook, Phantom Ship Overlook, Sun Notch, and a few unnamed ones.
My first “hike” of the day, if you can call it that, was a 0.5 mile loop at Sun Notch to get a great view of Phantom Ship Island.
Most people know the large island in Crater Lake is Wizard Island, but Phantom Ship (supposedly the pinnacles look like ship masts) is often overlooked.
There are several additional potential islands in the lake if the water level drops which is entirely possible because Crater Lake is formed from rainfall – it is not fed by any springs or rivers.
One additional stop was Vidae Falls. All you have to do is pull off the road and it’s there in front of you. It is a fairly tall fall but not with a tremendous amount of water flow.
I returned to the cabin for lunch and then tried one more time for The Watchman – a spectacular hike. Again the road wait but when I got to the pull out, the weather was actually worse. You couldn’t see the top at all. I don’t know how the road crews do it but they were laying asphalt in that weather when visibility was about 15 feet.
I decided it was a good day to curl up in bed so I started back to the cabin when Godfrey Glen Trail caught my eye. It’s found near Mazama Vikkage and it is a 1.0 mile “easy” loop along Munson Creek Canyon. You can hear Duwee Falls as you walk the trail but the canyon is too steep to see the falls.
Tomorrow I set out for Columbia River Gorge to eventually see Multnomah Falls, the prime reason for this trip. Everything I’ve done so far has been planned around this stop. I hope for good weather the next day so I can get some good shots. Then I intend to view numerous other falls and overlooks along the gorge.
Is the water in Crater Lake salty? I’m guessing there is no outlet and that since it is volcanic the rocks aren’t very porous, so the only way for water to leave would be evaporation, meaning it would be salty. You mentioned the water level varies with the rainfall and made me start to wonder about the salinity of the water.
Not salty to my knowledge. Level stays fairly consistent due to snow melt.