By Lee Juillerat
for the Mail Tribune
CRATER LAKE NATIONAL PARK — Jeff Cook came from Florida.
Elsa Porcaro and her husband, daughter, father and three sisters made the journey from Minnesota. Home for Brett and Mary Donley is South Dakota.
Crater Lake National Park reopened to the public Monday after being closed since March 24 because of COVID-19. On Tuesday, the Donleys, Porcaros and Cook took the opportunity to visit the park and see the lake. All of them were viewing Crater Lake for the first time.
“I was 280 miles north when I heard Crater Lake was open,” said Cook, a food salesman who is traveling while taking a voluntary furlough. He left Florida in early May and is taking a circuitous route to northern Michigan. “I’m taking the longest possible route. I wanted to take my time so I could do something like this,” he said, turning to look at Crater Lake from a viewpoint at Discovery Point. “It’s impressive. I had no idea what to expect.”
Porcaro and her family are traveling in an RV during a two-week road trip. She and one of her sisters are nurses in Stillwater, Minnesota, and, like the rest of the family, are glad to be away from home. They had originally been scheduled to make a family outing in Europe, but the pandemic altered those plans. “This was the next option.”
Pocaro’s family members took turns being photographed at Discovery Point with the lake and Wizard Island in the background while holding Porcaro’s daughter, Amalia, who just turned a year old.
“So far, great!” Porcaro said of seeing Crater Lake and resuming their wanderings.
“I wanted to come out here,” Brett Donley said from a lake overlook at Rim Village, where he and his wife were taking selfies. “Crater Lake has always been one of my things I’ve wanted to see. I like it. It’s everything I’ve seen in pictures and on television.”
“We’re hoping to come back next year,” added Mary Donley, explaining they began their travels from Pierre, South Dakota.
Unusually, they were the only two people at the typically crowded lake overlook that’s just steps away from the Crater Lake Rim Village Cafe-Gift Shop. Like the rest of the park and small portion of Rim Drive that were open Tuesday, it was eerily void of visitors.
The parking lot at the Steel Center Visitor Center in Munson Valley, where visitors normally watch park orientation films and learn about things to do and see in the park, was empty. Fewer than a half-dozen cars were parked near the Rim Village gift shop, with about the same number of vehicles at Discovery Point. In parking areas and along the park’s few open roads, out-ofstate license plates
were common — Ohio, Oklahoma, Texas, Minnesota, California, Florida, Washington, Alaska, Colorado, Wyoming, Massachusetts — and easily outnumbered plates from Oregon.
“I was 280 miles north when I heard Crater Lake was open,” said Floridian Jeff Cook, a food salesman who is traveling while taking a voluntary furlough. He left Florida in early May and is taking a circuitous route to northern Michigan. “I’m taking the longest possible route. I wanted to take my time so I could do something like this,” he said, turning to look at Crater Lake from a viewpoint at Discovery Point. “It’s impressive. I had no idea what to expect.”
Andrew and Elsa Porcaro and their year-old daughter, Amalia, pose for photos at Crater Lake’s Discover Point overlook.
Most visitors stopped at the gift shop, where employees for Aramark, the company starting its second season as the park concessionaire, were all wearing face masks and practicing social distancing.
“We’re opening, and we’ll see how it works,” said Paul Thornton, Aramark district manager. He said the only major change is the cancellation of always popular ranger-narrated lake boat tours. But there are also changes at the historic Crater Lake Lodge, where only lodge guests will be allowed inside as part of an effort to maintain social distancing. Thornton said the lodge could open later this week or next week.
“We’re hoping to have them open sooner than later,” he said of concession facilities at Annie Springs, including another gift shop-restaurant, cabins, gas station and the Mazama Campground. Food concessions will be take-away only.
“Everything will be available on a limited basis.”
Thornton said hiring has been challenging because of limited employee housing and uncertainties stemming from the virus. Most concession staff are usually lodged in dormitory-style facilities.
Aramark normally hires 200plus seasonal workers, but Thornton said only about half that number will likely be on duty this summer.
Thornton emphasized Aramark services could be expanded through the summer, depending on safety guidelines. Caution is being taken by Aramark and Crater Lake park managers because some national parks that recently reopened have been inundated with visitors, which has created concerns about spreading coronavirus to visitors and park employees. “We want to make it safe for our team, for our visitors.”
Similar concerns are expressed by Marcia McCabe, Crater Lake’s longtime chief of interpretation, who noted, “Maintaining safety for our employees, staff and visitors is our top priority.”
Like Aramark, park officials are facing challenges in providing housing for summer seasonal staff.
Because of staff reductions, informational sign boards have been placed outside buildings normally visited by tourists, including the Steel Information Center in Munson Valley and the Kiser Visitor Center and Sinnott Memorial Overlook at Rim Village. Restrooms are available at Rim Village, but the park’s vault toilets are currently closed. McCabe said ranger-ledprograms typically offered during summer months,such as Garfield Peak and Sun Notch hikes, lodgetalks and evening campfire programs, will not be provided. The summer seasonal staff, which normally employs 20 people, currently has four people and could expand to six.
“Every year is different, but this year adds extra difficulties,” said McCabe, who is in her 23rd year at Crater Lake.
“We’re trying to do the best we can with what we have.”
McCabe and Thornton emphasized that Crater Lake typically opens in stages because of heavy winter snow — 535 inches in an average winter. Although snowfall is far below average, snow remains at varying depths at the park’s higher elevations and along Rim Drive. Nine inches fell last Saturday, the most snow on a June 6 since the park began keeping records in 1931. Saturday’s and Sunday’s snowfall forced park officials to delay the planned reopening of West Rim Drive to the North Junction and the North Entrance Road. It’s expected those sections will be open sometime this week, when snowplows and crews will shift their focus to East Rim Drive.
Park trails, including Watchman Peak, Mount Scott, Garfield Peak, Cleetwood Cove, Plaikni Falls and Sun Notch, remain closed because of snow. Most are typically not open until late June or July.
Park visitors are being encouraged to buy passes online through recreation.
gov to help reduce lines at the Annie Springs and North Entrance stations or, at the entrance stations, use credit cards instead of cash. To buy passes, see www.recreation.gov/sitepass/2647.
McCabe said visitors need to exercise caution visiting the park, especially in spring and early summer. “This is the time of year that always makes me nervous,” she said, noting many visitors are not prepared for snow and often disregard warning signs at lake overlooks. Over the years, fatalities have occurred because visitors try to get too close to the rim and fall.
“Please, please, please don’t go too close to the edge.”
For updated information, see the National Park Service website at www.nps.gov/crla.
For information on concession offerings, see the Crater Lake Hospitality website at www.travelcraterlake.com.
Reach freelance writer Lee Juillerat at 337lee337@charter.net or 541-880-4139.
