July 13th

On the Rim of Crater Lake
1:06pm
Everyone here is foreign- there are very few American tourists. Tom and I hitchhiked up to the rim village with a nice older couple from Buffalo, New York. The lake is so blue, though. And we have been able to go to a bunch of ranger presentations about the geologic history of the area (previous volcano, which erupted, then collapsed, and became Crater Lake- over the course of thousands of years). Pretty awesome. We are sitting on the rim of the lake (about 1000 feet up from the water) and just taking in all of the views.


Mazama Village
7:44pm
Today was a great day. We hitched back down to the Mazama Village after a beautiful (although very sunny, and sunscreen-less) day. We got 2 rides from nice older couples- not at all who we expected to pick us up. But it was a great day. When we got back to Mazama we sat outside the store and just met tons of other hikers. We ran into two guys we had crossed paths with on day 3 on the trail. They had set out for a few days of simple hiking and had ran into too much snow, so have been jumping around and trying to find a snow-free trail. They said there is snow all the way up Oregon too, and then a lot more in Washington. But all of the hikers have reaffirmed by fear of snow- everyone is pulling out or jumping ahead- even Edelweis. She is going to hitch north and try from there. But at least we have a lot in common with everyone.

Tom got a trail name today from Edelweis: Van Gogh (so perfect).


In the tent
8:37pm
The mosquitoes are still horrible. So went spend most of our free time sitting out front of the store at a picnic table in the sun, sporadically buying more snacks. And everyone here is so chatty- we all have this national park in common, which is very neat. I have had great conversations the past few days about what we are doing, etc. People are very curious about the trail and hikers, and Tom and I wearing our beige suits. It is really nice to have indoor bathrooms, too. I was so tired of having to go poop in the woods while being swarmed with mosquitoes. It was horrible.

Today this couple was unpacking their cooler at a picnic table and offered us their leftover produce (they were this cute couple from rural Alaska). So for dinner we made this delicious veggie rice soup. Yum.

Today we said goodbye to Edelweis. She was hitching off into the sunset (actually, to Shelter Cove).

We are very, very sunburned. We made it on the trail without getting burned, being super careful with sunscreen. And then today we left camp without a second thought (it was so chilly, the sun wasn't even on our mind). And now we are going to pay for it. But right now we are heading to a ranger program about the winter in Crater Lake National Park.