Crater Lake

This summer, Chad and I took a weekend trip to Crater Lake. Neither of our families are big on camping, so we had ever been there....which I felt was pretty shameful. Crater Lake is famous around the world after all! But we still didn't really know what to expect. HOLY MOSES!!! It's AMAZING!!! We couldn't believe our eyes! I didn't know water could be that blue.....at least not in America. I thought I would have to see Grecian oceans to see water that blue, but nope! After our excursion, I consider Crater Lake to be the sapphire of the northwest. Why didn't people tell us how beautiful it was?!
Okay, I always thought water was the color of the sky (cuz water reflects what the sky looks like)....but that is not entirely true. An information board explained why Crater Lake is so blue, and then I remembered that I had learned about it in middle school....tehe. So, I'm going to try to explain it, cuz it's so cool, but I know it will be confusing...but you just have to know how it works....cuz the world is so neat! Basically, colors are bouncing around everywhere, and we can't see them. Colors are constantly hitting everything. Let's say they hit your red car. The paint in your car has tons of different elements/chemicals etc, and it absorbs all the colors except for RED, the red is refracted back, and that is why your car looks red, because all the other colors were absorbed (i don't know how, sorry...lol) but the red bounces back to your eye. I hope that generally makes sense, I'm not an expert. Anyway, let's apply this to Crater Lake. At the bottom of the lake rests weird elements and chemicals that absorb all colors except blue, so the color bouncing back into our eyes, is blue. Hurrah!
It was surreal.
Phantom Ship, see it?
Can you believe that's water?
Closer angle of Phantom Ship.








We had planned to ride our bikes around the lake.....yeah right!!!! Tons of websites had advertised bike riding....so we took our bikes. You would be a serious nutter if you rode your bike there. The road is SOOOO thin (I made Chad drive), and STEEP (I don't think we could have even gotten over half of those hills on bikes...torture!), plus you can rarely see the lake from it.....LAME! Basically, all you can do there is hike. Cool, I LOVE to hike.....Chad on the other hand hikes because I like it. Weird huh? I thought all guys liked hiking....isn't it supposed to be the other way around, where the hubby is always trying to convince the wife to go hiking, then he learns to never take her cuz she complains too much? (Chad didn't complain though) So, I saw this really cool trail, and I convinced Chad to take it. It wasn't even bad, plus we got incredible views.

It was a great little getaway. But because there was only hiking, and no biking, we only stayed one night (instead of 2) so we could get back to our dog....lol. We took her to the coast the next day instead.
Isn't he cute?