Day 22: After we came down from the mountain...

Prepare yourself for this post.

That is the truest representation of the color yet.

To celebrate the hike, we let our kids play in the dirt at our campsite (so dusty and dry everywhere). Wallow might be a more accurate verb for what they were doing.

And to celebrate the dirtiness, we gave the kids baths. 

The water wasn't as warm as we had hoped so we heard Gusty chanting "so cold so cold so cold" for a few minutes. He stopped while I was grabbing his pajamas. This is what I saw when I came back with jammies in hand:

No seriously. I didn't stage this. 

Cute boys.

Day 22: Our boys' first summit

There is no way to capture in a picture just how blue and awe inspiring that water is in real life.

It is disorienting to see what appears to be just a tiny wake of a tinier boat on a massive lake.

Or how it feels to be able to see the entire 6 mile wide lake from one vantage point. 

It is surreal to watch the rockslides going and going and falling and going all the way down the cliffs into the caldera. 

Since we did one of the easiest hikes yesterday, it seems only right to do the hardest Crater Lake has to offer today, right?

Today, our boys summitted their first mountain: Mount Scott.

The hike we are taking goes up through the trees on the right, along the ridge, and to the look out tower at the summit just out of view on the left.

 It is not a particularly high mountain. But it is above the clouds.

And it is the highest point in the park.

The kids did not hike the whole way by themselves. 

But, we all made it up.

We sat at the top and ate lunch and enjoyed the views as much as my nerves and their enthusiasm for exploring would allow me.

And we all made it back down. Bear counted snags and quit at 88 and Gusty just counted (he can confidently count to six). The boys loved when the pine trees "brushed their hair" and we compared the ages of everyone in our families.