Another view of Crater Lake (5/6)

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Despite the snow in this picture, it wasn’t taken in the winter. Although the image didn’t have a date, I’d judge that it was probably taken in what most people would consider the spring; most likely May and possibly early June.

You might have noticed the color of the lake, both in this image and in the first one. It is usually described as ‘deep sapphire blue’. The reason for the blueness of the lake is that the water is nearly pure. In fact, tests run on the water when I lived there showed it to be 99.92% pure water. Water has a bluish tint, but it isn’t because of the tint that the lake is so blue.

Rather, the depth of the water and it’s clarity and purity cause the water to absorb nearly all of the colors of the spectrum, except for blue. That is what we see because it is the only color left after the lake has absorbed everything else.

To get a grasp of this picture, the person who took the picture was standing roughly 1,100 feet above the surface of the lake. It is a long way down there!

Written by Rex Trulove

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