7/11/2015 Portland, Oregon

We made it to Portland last night. It’s feels like years since Sacramento. Jill and I spent ten days apart at the same meditation camp. There was no speaking or interaction allowed between the men and the women or with anyone for that matter. I think I am still pondering what I got out of it. Jill wrote all about her experience. After the camp we went to San Francisco and ended up calling home a small sailboat in a marina. It was more or less a floating tent with a view of Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge. We didn’t complain about our free accommodation. While in SF we visited the John Muir House where he grew fruit trees, raised a family, and fought for the preservation of beautiful wild lands. He led an amazing life and his activism led to the creation of the National Park Service. We also visited the Coit Tower for its murals of Californian industries. They were commissioned by the New Deal in the 1930s. Coit also offers spectacular views of San Francisco and the bay. It is perched atop Telegraph Hill which made for a tough bike ride. We decided to drive to the restaurant Burma Superstar where we waited an hour for a table. The food was phenomenal and worth the wait, our favorite was Tea Leaf Salad that they mix at the table. After discovering that Alcatraz tours were booked solid for two months we headed out and up the coast. I’m excited to return to SF someday for all of the things that we have not done there.

Driving in California means constantly being flabbergasted by the sights around every corner and this drive was no disappointment. We watched the sunset over the ocean from a turn out. Huge Redwoods and fir trees line the road and stretch over the valleys around Redwood Nation Park. We stopped for the night at a hotel in Crescent City.

Crater Lake National Park greeted us the next evening. We flirted with the Pacific Crest Trail there. It runs through the park and there were some thru-hikers running around the park store. Hiking on the PCT is ever more tempting after seeing some of the west coast’s stunning natural beauty. We drove out to the PCT after supper and took a short walk on it, then we returned to our tent and went to sleep. The sound of dripping rain carried me to dream land. The next day we had to clear out to make room for the weekend rush. Parks are popular on the weekends. We drove to a hiking trail called Crater Peak. The cloudy sky unloaded on us a few minutes into the hike. I got out my umbrella and Jill dawned her plastic poncho and on we hiked into the mist. After that hike it is apparent to me that Crater Lake does not suffer from the drought that California is having. It rained on us for the entire trek of three hours. I felt jaunty with my umbrella and we stayed relatively dry for the entire time. It was a little anticlimactic at the top as Crater peak was shrouded in a cloud. The Crater Peak hike, despite its name, does not give one a view of the Crater Lake. The brochure says the hiker enjoys expansive views of Klamath basin to the south. We had no view beyond a line of trees and a meadow except our imaginations. The trail petered out above the meadow with no evidence of an ending. It seemed we could’ve been lost quite easily in the mist, but after a little water break we retraced our steps and went down the mountain.

Driving out along the rim we finally got a view of the mythic Crater Lake. The blue of it is utterly unnatural to me. It was highlighted by several sunbeams in the clearing sky. Crater Lake is 1943 feet deep, making the deepest lake in the world. It’s only water source is snow and rain. Several types of fish were introduced to it in 1888, but only trout and salmon live there now. Fishing is allowed without restriction or license. One doesn’t have to worry about snagging the bottom of the lake. Thankful we got to see one more amazing thing, we drove on for Portland.