Yes that is me. Why do you think I'm called FLYING BOBCAT? Merely a 20 foot drop, but since you can see more than 100 feet straight down into the water, it sure felt farther!

Having internet troubles today, but I will do my best to upload a few photos. These are out of order, meaning that they were taken yesterday as opposed to weeks ago when I last left off on updating the blog about the hike, so forgive me por favor. As you may be able to divine, I was at Crater Lake National Park yesterday. I could gush and hem and haw for pages about that place and the myriad fantastic experiences I had there, but I'm a bit rushed so I'll just say that the lake started forming about 7,700 years ago when Mount Mazama, a giant stratovolcano, blew up with 50 times the force of Mt. St. Helens. When the magma chamber below emptied, the mountain which once stood around 12,000 feet high, simply collapsed in on itself (note to self: If I ever get a chance to ride in a time machine that can fly, I want to go back and watch this collapse. Imagine a mountain higher than Mount Rainier covered with glaciers first blowing up and then collapsing into a smoldering depression 4,000 feet deep!!!!!!! Better than space tourism I tell ya.) Over hundreds of years rain and snow filled the crater with the purest of waters creating a lake of unparalleled beauty and intrigue. It has the distinction of being the purest and clearest lake in the world and visibility from the surface was once measured at 144 feet. (That's how far down you'd be able to see your camera sink if you dropped it off the side of the boat) It's also one of the deepest lakes, number 7 in the world at nearly 2,000 feet deep. But anyways, the stars aligned in such a way that I was able to take a few unexpected zero days there (My old boss from working in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park in Alaska 8 years ago just HAPPENS to be the new Chief Ranger at Crater Lake, which I found out completely by chance. So my old friend took me into his government housing and fed me to no end, even gave me a short saxophone concert in his living room. Unbelievable! Since I was more than happy to stick around the park a few days and catch up, I took a boat tour of the place and climbed famous Wizard Island both before and after swimming in the magnificent blue waters. Here are three highlights from the few hundred photos I shot there.


Flying on Wizard Island's crater rim. The island rises more than 700 feet above the lake surface.


Later in the day after returning to shore, wildfire smoke gives a haziness and a mysterious quality to the lake. Just one of the many moods of what remains of Mount Mazama. There's Wizard Island in the background, remember, more than 700 feet high... the scale of this place is absolutely breathtaking.