From the Caldera Into the Fire
We awake this morning in our rustic cabin on Diamond Lake. The sun rise is behind us and we enjoyed the pleasure and grandeur of the sunset over the mountain ridge last night from a pontoon boat that I cajoled our group into renting. I was asked if I knew how to pilot a boat and I said, “sure!” The truth is, I did go for two summers to Lake Mendota YMCA day camp in 1962-3. I attended for eight weeks both years thanks to my chocolate thin-mint selling capabilities. I sold more than any other camper both years and maxed out on the full eight weeks free of charge. That was a necessary requirement for an eight-year-old that desperately wanted to go to summer camp (did I mention I lived with a mother and two older sisters?) and who had a graduate student mother on a $3,000/year fellowship, which after rent left $1,800 per year for all the luxuries like utilities, food, clothing, school supplies, etc.. There was no line item for summer camp so if I was going to go, I was going on my own steam. Hence the chocolate thin-mint sales program, which I’m sure the YMCA figured would chip a little off the camp bill for erstwhile parents. They had no idea who they were dealing with in Richard Albert Prosdocimi (my birth name before my father changed it the next year to Marin). Speaking of the next year, it was 1964 when my mother wrangled me a spot for six weeks at Camp Red Arrow in northern Wisconsin. I’m not sure what she did to convince the old codger who owned and ran the camp, but I know she never gave him a dime for my summer there. I even got horseback riding thrown in (an added cost per the brochure), so whatever it was that she did, she did it well. It was Red Arrow where I really learned about boating on lakes.
And then there was that time about twenty years ago when I thought I needed an “On Golden Pond” wooden lake boat, so I bought a 23-foot Chris-Craft with burgundy tuck & roll upholstery that got hauled in from Lake Minnetonka, Minnesota. That was a nice toy for a few years until I got tired of paying the six months of winter storage just to take it out on a straight-as-an-arrow Cayuga Lake run. The lack of coves or cute places to dock for lunch made it all less charming than I had imagined. I won’t embarrass myself by telling you the bid-offer spread from buying and then selling from and to the same guy from Minnetonka. That’s the way it goes with toys.
But this morning Diamond Lake is like glass and judging by the family groups heading out to swim and fish, it looks to be a busy day on the lake. After everyone has their morning caffein fix, we head down to Crater Lake. Frank had warned me that we would be in the middle of nowhere, but I was unaware just how true that would be. We drove for thirty miles and hardly saw anything except lodgepole pines. Then we started our climb up to the rim trail that circumnavigated the caldera of Crater Lake. The caldera or volcanic crater was formed 7,700 years ago by the eruption of Mount Mazama. It is 2,128 feet deep and is filled from underground springs to form a 1,949 foot-deep lake of crystal-clear ice-cold dark-blue water, making it the deepest lake in the United States. The evaporation and replenishment cycle means the lake is recycled about every 250 years. Again nature makes a pipsqueak of man.
An interesting thing about visiting Crater Lake is that the road that rings it is both narrow and has no guardrails. It is well-maintained, but without those rails, one feels like one is only one bad curve away from a 2,000-foot free-fall into the annals of Thelma and Louise territory. We drove carefully down off the caldera and wound our way through more and more and more pine forest on our way to Klamath Falls. You might ask why our target was Klamath Falls and the answer is that it’s the only thing resembling a town for miles in any direction. There we stopped and had a nice breakfast bagel sandwich on as good an everything bagel as you’ll find in Brooklyn. Someone has brought the boiled baked goods technology westward to the campus of Oregon Tech – Klamath Falls Outpost.
From Klamath Falls we headed into the Northern Territory of California, where agricultural check-points do for errant beetles and aphids what ICE does at the Mexican border to erstwhile immigrants and refugee-seekers. We pass muster and carry on, heading eastward into the desert that eventually becomes the vast Black Rock Desert Wilderness of Nevada. Before getting into the no-tell state we find ourselves in the dry lakebed of the Surprise Valley, known for its hot springs, which are a direct result of the multiple volcanic caldera that exist in this region. Oregon has 60 volcanoes where California has only seven, but most of them in both states have been passed or driven by today or yesterday by us. Where there are active or semi-active volcanoes, there are generally hot springs nearby.
At this very moment, there is a private hot spring outside our hotel room in the blazing sun. As soon as the umbrella shade overtakes the tub, I plan to go in and test the waters. I am very happy to have finally found somewhere to take Frank that he has not heretofore been. This is a new spot to him and he looked generally pleased to be introduced to it for a night’s stay. As a senior citizen, and living in San Francisco and Sonoma, but growing up in San Francisco and having ski condos in both Utah and Incline Village, Nevada for years, this is truly Frank’s stomping grounds. He knows all about the geology and history (as well as pre-history). His status as a Marshall Scholar who studied at the London School of Economics further qualifies him as a source authority on just about everything. Sometimes I think he was an original member of the Donner Party. His years of venture capital dealmaking certainly establish his credentials as a man-eater.
I have known Frank for 29 years. I’ve known His wife for 31 years. I am somewhat responsible for pushing them towards each other about fifteen years ago when Frank was widowed and The Mrs. divorced. I am glad to say they seem to be well-suited after a trivial adjustment period of….fifteen years. In fact, it was just this year that they finally tied the knot.
From the pontoon boat of Diamond Lake to the bubbling waters from the depths of the earth, it’s been an interesting transition day. Here’s to hoping that unlike our travels today through volcanic terrain and going from the caldera into the fire of the desert, Frank will find marriage to be less of a hotfoot dance and more of a walk in the warm sand of later life.