You want to click on the pictures to make them bigger. You really do. Then read this. I am going here for my birthday. Which isn't until August, true, but if you want a cabin at Clear Lake in the summer, you'd damn well better reserve it in January. While the NW folks are being rounded up as we speak, if any of my East Coast bitches wanna come out, well, you'd be hard-pressed to find a better reason than Clear Lake. I'm totally trying to tantalize you.
It is the most beautiful place on earth. No joke. If there were a heaven, it couldn't possibly not look like this. The story as I understand it goes that a volcano erupted about 3,000 years ago & created the lake where once stood a forest. You can still see petrified trees standing in the water. For reals. The lagoon (I think it's technically a "spring", but we always call it the "lagoon") feeds water to the lake at such a rate that (1) the temperature of the water never rises above 34 degrees F & (2) the lake never freezes. No motorboats are allowed. It does what it says on the tin & is, indeed, pristinely clear - you can see the bottom up to depths of 100+ feet. Apparently the fishin's pretty good too. (Side note: it's really, really, really fun to drop small-ish volcanic rock into the blue part of the clear - you can watch them hit the bottom & send up mushroom clouds of sand. Your very own mini-nuclear bombs!)
Anyway, my family went there every year while I was growing up. I used to play with My Little Ponys in the water while sitting in a moored rowboat, & still fairly frequently have dreams set at the lake. One of the best days I ever had involved me drifting around in a rowboat, toes in the water, just watching the bottom of the lake . For like four hours. Course, I was also smoking pot, but I've done it sober too (probably not for quite as long...) & it's just as much fun. Plus, there's a five-mile trail around the lake, & waterfalls within walking distance, & ice caves nearby, & on & on & on.
Sheesh. This Oregon really is a gorgeous place. I feel spectacularly fortunate to have so much so close. Plus, Portland is just friggin' awesome, but that's a whole nother topic.
