What an iridescent blue! Voici le lac volcanique le plus profond du monde, au sommet d’un titan endormi dans les Rocheuses. This gem of nature is called Crater Lake and lent its name to the 4th National Park of the United States, established in 1902 in Oregon. he 54 km² of pure water are so intensely blue you’d think they were ink, held in place by 600m-high cliffs. Many Amerindian legends tell the story of this temple of biodiversity…

According to legend, the bluebird of the mountains was grey before diving into these magical waters. A gem of the Cascade Range, Crater Lake National Park might be less renowned than Yellowstone or Yosemite, but it has nothing to envy in terms of their breathtaking beauty.

This crater, once Mount Mazama, has a cataclysmic origin. Its eruption dates back to 5700 BC and ejected so much pumice that the summit collapsed, creating a giant, steaming caldera. – Millions of tons of ash from this cone were found hundreds of kilometers away, reaching Wyoming, Nevada, and British Columbia.

Rising to 1883 meters today, this mountain holds a lake 600 meters deep. Almost one-third of its height. After the eruption, over the centuries, rain and snowmelt accumulated in the caldera. Wildflowers, along with the Canada hemlock, fir, and pine, recolonized the surroundings. Black bears, red lynxes, deer, marmots, eagles, and falcons resettled its slopes. Check out this article from Geo Magazine.

And these waters are so clear that the naked eye can see down to a depth of thirty-seven metres.

A Venetian crystal lake mixed with the ashes of the Earth.

Oregon is one of the American states that fascinates me.
The Cascade Range forms a biological and climatic barrier between Oregon’s western region along the Pacific, covered by a lush temperate forest, and the eastern area—a semi-arid desert known as the High Desert of Oregon.. Les eaux sont si limpides qu’on peut voir jusqu’à trente-sept mètres de profondeur à l’œil nu.

A world unto itself where oceanic, Mediterranean, desert, and alpine climates coexist. And Native American legends…
Ursula Kroeber Le Guin, one of my favorite fiction authors and a master of the Planet Opera genre, left the United States for France, where she married a Breton historian. Together, they decided to live near Portland, Oregon.

She probably found landscapes whose intense reality surpasses fiction.