News from Jules | 08.20.2024 | Pure Magic
As real, if not more real.
Only a few minutes since setting out from Crater Lake Lodge on the trail up Garfield Peak—as highly recommended by the well-weathered and very enthusiastic National Park Ranger near the visitor center where of course I stopped for postcards as soon as I arrived—I was completely mesmerized by the swarms of dragonflies buzzing through the warm air and bursts of yellow, red and purple wildflowers everywhere I looked.
I was mid-step when something zipped across the trail in front of me and over to a bush so fast that I abruptly halted and shook my head as I blurted out loud: What the heck was that?
After a moment of hesitation, I immediately quickened my steps toward the green bush fifty feet ahead to look closer, but there was nothing there. Huh. Did I make that up? Was it just a gust of wind? I wondered.
But, there it was again.
I heard the buzzing first as it emerged from the bush before I saw it dart up the rocky hillside. Its tiny body pivoted left to right, mind processing as fast as its wings beating 30 miles per hour, as it chose its next nectar stop.
I smiled. Of course it was a hummingbird.
Hummingbirds and dragonflies popping up along my path—or noticeably absent—usually felt like a sign of being exactly where I’m supposed to be. A magical reminder for me to be present, stay true to myself, and keep adapting.
Just like a year ago: When I had a face-to-face encounter with a hummingbird the day before I left Bend, Ore. last summer in July, 2023, and set off on my whimsy way through the West for three months. My first stop was at Crater Lake National Park just two hours south of Bend to jump into the vast, deep blue unknown.
It was also my first time hiking down to the water’s edge. I was amazed at what had always looked like impenetrable blue water from the rim 1,000 feet above, but then it appeared turquoise around the edges as I descended, and once I jumped off the dock and opened my eyes in the water for a moment, it was crystal clear. Sure that’s the science of the light spectrum being absorbed in such pure water.
And it was also the pure magic of nature.
Just like every previous visit—this was my fifth time in 15 years—I felt drawn to be here. After actually swimming in the lake a year ago, I was more curious to explore Wizard Island, but the tour boats were out of service. I made a note on my heart’s bucket list to return before the annual pass I had just purchased expired.
See blast from the past photos from Crater Lake on Instagram.
Which is why I visited Crater Lake for the first time. The annual National Parks pass from my first solo road trip in the fall of 2008 was about to expire and it seemed silly not to visit Oregon’s only National Park, so I booked a campsite for Labor Day weekend of 2009 and headed across the state.
Back then, I figured it was the only time I’d ever be there, and I wanted to see it all. Of course, I couldn’t in one visit, but I did get the big picture.
“When we go down to the lowest of the low tide lines and look down into the shallow waters, there’s all the excitement of discovering a new world. Once you have entered such a world, its fascination grows and somehow you find your mind has gained a new dimension, a new perspective,” said scientist and author of Silent Spring, the catalyst of the environmental movement, Rachel Carson, during a speech in 1955.
“And always thereafter you find yourself remembering the beauty and strangeness and wonder of that world—a world that is as real, as much a part of the universe, as our own.”
As real, if not more real.
And so, before my annual National Parks pass expired at the end of July, 2024, I booked a campsite and a seat on the boat shuttle.
Just like a year ago: My mind was blank. My heart was open.
As I drove the long and winding road into Crater Lake National Park and breathed in the pure mountain air, I sensed my heart expanding like the wide open meadows as the mindless worries and thoughts about work, money, life, and so on drifted out of my open window.
A few minutes later, I set out from the lodge toward the park ranger’s highly recommended views from Garfield Peak.
I didn’t know if I could make it to the summit. And I no longer cared. I just wanted to find an inspiring place to draw something beautiful. To attune my energy with its earthly core. To feel deeply connected to life all around me.
My quest during these 24-hour adventures all summer as soon as I clock out on Wednesday afternoons and then observe my Sabbath on Thursdays. And during last fall’s road trip. And these past few nomadic years. Well actually my whole life.
As I rounded a switchback—sweat dripping down the back of my long-sleeved Patagonia sun shirt and calves aching for a break after already hiking longer and higher than I expected—I saw a couple perched on some rocks and vast blue skies above them. Surely, there was a spot with a view nearby.
I followed the rocky trail as it arced left until I saw a break in the trees up ahead and a flash of the unbelievable sapphire blue that pales the baby blue sky in comparison. The trail kept going up and back through the trees, but I stopped, pivoted to the left, and stepped toward the sandy sloping edge to sit on a boulder some 1,500 feet above the water to take it all in.
It still took my breath away every time.
I immediately sat down to draw, even though I knew my black pen and ink sketches wouldn’t do justice to such majesty.
The ultramarine waters stretch six miles across to thousand-foot cliffs surrounding the 20-mile circumference of the lake’s shoreline, which has only been accessible for the last 100 years or so of its 7,700-year lifespan. So vast and yet still comprehensible, unlike the Great Lakes, because one can see it all—where ancient rock meets the evercycling water, the surrounding meadows and forests, and the mountains far beyond, all under the same cloudy sky.
My awe, wonder and curiosity activate the magical timewarp of my imagination that connects me to the past, present, and future.
Was this what it looked like 7,500 years ago?
Once the animals returned, once the winds spread seeds, once the pines grew back, once the people whose ancestors felt the mountain rumble eventually explored this edge. Some 200 years after what we call Mount Mazama erupted and imploded to become what we call Crater Lake—which is actually a caldera that filled with 2,000 feet of rainwater and snow melt to form the deepest lake in the U.S.—and created Wizard Island, which is a much smaller volcano inside the mountain whose summit is actually a crater.
And what about 420,000 years ago?
When the earth was level, before the first eruptions formed the 9,000-foot Mount Scott, followed by the formation of the approximately 12,000-foot-tall Mount Mazama through a succession of overlapping volcanoes throughout the next half a million years.
And what about 200 years from now?
When the dragonflies are still swarming through the meadows, the wildflowers are still blooming, the deer are still bounding through the hillsides, some of the very same trees are still growing and the rocks have barely even changed yet.
As I glanced up at the landscape, then down at the small rectangle page, my mind quickly translated the image—its colors, highlights, shadows, edges, texture—into a shape as my pen flowed across the page, I am choosing what to notice and what to ignore.
Choosing what to include, what to leave out. Choosing what to simplify, what to abstract. And often, ignoring the rules and/or accidentally skewing the perspective trying to squish more features onto the page—just like in every art class I attended from elementary school through college.
My imagination seeks the essence.
Each time I looked up at the view, then down at my sketchbook, I saw a landmark that sparked magical memories:
Summiting Mount Scott over to the east and watching lightening strike the lake from Watchman Overlook to the west before the wettest night of car camping ever during my first visit in 2009;
Watching sunset from the interpretive center roof then waking up before sunrise to run a 10k race with friends along the East Rim past the Cleetwood Cove trailhead in 2010;
Insisting our van detour for a pit stop at the North Junction to take in the breathtaking view only an hour before starting to run the nearly 220-mile Cascade Lakes Relay in 2018;
Hiking down to Cleetwood Cove for a quick dip on the way to Northern California and kicking off my three-month road trip in 2023.
Having only just arrived, I didn’t even know what other magical moments were still in store during the next 24 hours.
For instance, I actually summited Garfield Peak an hour after I finished sketching, then watched deer bounding through the meadow at dusk while discovering the glorious Castle Creek Wildflower Garden trail, before being invited to a late dinner by a kind couple in their ‘60s at a neighboring campsite.
And then, the next day I rode the speedboat across the lake and became fast friends with the cutest newlyweds on the summit of Wizard Island, before we hiked down and around the island together to swim in Fumarole Bay, played a fierce game of Uno with a ground squirrel, hiked back out, and drove to the Rim Village for celebratory ice cream sandwiches.
See beautiful photos from this summer’s trip to Crater Lake on Instagram.
Each of these magical trips is like the rungs of a tree, the layers of soil, the bands of rock, stacking up as part of the whole. When I come to these special places with a blank mind and an open heart, I feel connected to all those layers of past experiences—with myself, with others, with the earth, even within the cosmos.
That pure magic of nature.
“And always thereafter you find yourself remembering the beauty and strangeness and wonder of that world—a world that is as real, as much a part of the universe, as our own.”
As real, if not more real.
May you seek out magic this week.
Love,
Jules
"Hummingbirds and dragonflies popping up along my path—or noticeably absent—usually felt like a sign of being exactly where I’m supposed to be."
It's funny that you write this. When we first moved to SoCal, one thing I noticed that brightened my heart was the hummingbirds. There were quite a few chirpy little Anna's in our current apartment complex, and I knew then that it was a sign of "home." Since then, we feed a small army IF the tiny but fierce little Ruffus lets anyone close. He hangs out all day on the feeders and grooms himself, only stopping to chirp at intruders and chase them off "his lawn." :)
On another note, I absolutely love Crater Lake and hope to return again one day. Your drawing is wonderful :)
May the pure magic of hummingbirds, dragonflies, and the place in and around Crater Lake continue to fill you to overflowing in ways yet to be experienced in the past, present, and future!