Location
Crater Lake National Park
| Where | Southern Oregon, Cascade Range, [[oregon|Oregon]] |
|---|---|
| Established | 1902 |
| Size | ~183,000 acres |
| Depth | 1,943 ft — the deepest lake in the United States |
| Klamath name | Giiwas — "a most sacred place" |
| Note | Cradled in the collapsed caldera of Mount Mazama, which erupted ~7,700 years ago |
The deepest lake in the United States, held in the caldera left when Mount Mazama collapsed after a massive eruption roughly 7,700 years ago. No rivers feed it — it fills from rain and snowmelt alone, and that purity is what gives the water its famously deep blue. The 33-mile Rim Drive loops the whole caldera, and the Cleetwood Cove Trail — a strenuous 2.2-mile round trip that drops and then reclaims some 700 feet — is the only legal route down to the shoreline.
To the Klamath people the lake is Giiwas, a most sacred place. Their tradition tells of a battle between Llao, spirit chief of the below-world, and Skell, spirit chief of the above-world: when Llao was driven back underground his mountain fell in on him, leaving the great hollow that the rains slowly filled. Signed into a national park in 1902. Visited over a clear September day after a winter attempt years earlier turned back at the snowy rim.