July 5th:
The day was clear, calm, and warm. We decided to go for a hike in the caldera. The problem was: what to do with our food? About the best thing we could come up with (since there were no trees) was to put our food in dry bags (to minimize any odors) and then float them out in the lake in a packraft.
Note the "anchor"; we further protected the cache by covering the opening with the sleeping pad (birds?):
Hiking in the caldera with The Gates in the backgroud
Our objective became to climb Vent Mountain - the prominent feature in the caldera:
Recent lava flow and Birthday Pass:
Our entrance and the common entrance:
Once on the rim, we decided to walk all the way around it:
Looking at a random vent:
On the true summit:
After the hike, Eric wanted to swim out to get the boat. He came up with a very unique way to carry his paddle out:
After dinner we headed up two smaller features in the caldrea that gave us outstanding views of the wetlands in the caldera - an area teeming with avian life:
The warm spring and its beautiful colors:
Climbing the second dome with the first one in the background:
A river through the volcanic debris:
Looking down on our camp:
