Announcing Toddy!

Brick died in December 2010, and this past year I “interviewed” heavily for the job, but none of my sled dogs wanted to hang up their harnesses.It takes a special warmth and gentleness to deal with the responsibilities of being the Meeter and Greeter. One has to manage all the comings and goings of the guests, from the most senior to the most junior, as well as canine visitors of all ages, breeds, shapes, sizes and temperaments. Not to mention the occasional bird, feline or equine guest. Being a good Meeter and Greeter can be exhausting!

So, I finally decided to look elsewhere, and at the Tehama County Animal Shelter I found…Toddy! She’s fairly young, about 2-3 years old, and a petite girl weighing in at just over 30 pounds.

She adores guests and is taking to her new job with utter delight! The moment she even thinks someone has arrived her tail starts wagging her and she eagerly awaits your arrival. Saying hi is her favorite…even moreso than eating, although she’s got the “I’ll sit for a treat” routine down pat.

Being a shelter dog, she was a little reserved around all my sled dogs at first. However, she quickly discovered the love of her life…Crimp! She worships the ground he walks on, pesters him incessantly — nibbles, licks, sits on him,rubs against him, chases him.

Those of you who know Crimp’s story know that this is not necessarily his cup of tea. Since being attacked as a puppy, he’s not been real eager to play with other dogs, unless they were sled dogs on his team and even then…not so much. Toddy has made it her mission in life to bring Crimp out of his shell — he WILL play with her! Crimp looks really put upon and looks at me pleadingly to make her stop — but I’m too busy laughing!

Shhh, don’t tell…but he’s starting to relax and enjoy her attention.

Toddy looks forward to your visit and meeting you — believe me, she’ll abandon Crimp in an instant when there’s the opportunity for human attention!!!

http://news.yahoo.com/wandering-wolf-inspires-hope-dread-094012216.html

All of this is pretty accurate from what I told Jeff (the reporter) but as usual, that’s not the whole story.

One new add-on tidbit…about a week, maybe 10 days ago, I heard a wolf howl. Whether he/she was responding to my sled dogs, or they were responding to him/her, I don’t know.

I was outside my house, just behind Crystalwood Lodge, and my dog yard started singing. Those of you that have been here know that the Lodge is on the south side of a knoll overlooking the front meadow to the west (where I saw OR-7 in late October) and the Upper Klamath National Wildlife Refuge to the east. My sled dog yard is on the north side of the knoll, tucked away enough not to bother guests, but close enough I can hear what’s going on if there’s a problem or commotion.

The dogs occasionally sing (howl) a couple of times during the day, often at dawn and dusk and every once in a while during the day, usually as a “thank you, we’re feeling good” howl after feeding, which often sounds like this: Dogyard After Dinner Song. This howl was later afternoon, but still light out, so maybe 4-4:30pm, I was just walking back from the Lodge to my house having put the dog food and water away after coming back from feeding.

I heard the yard start to sing — and immediately a distant but distinctive reply. I’m pretty doggone sure it wasn’t a coyote howl — if you’ve ever heard the two, coyote howls vs. wolf howls, they’re quite different. Coyotes have short bursts of howling, and it then goes into yips and yaps. Their songs are much shorter, more variable in tone and melody, kinda all over the place.

This distant howl, coming from the north toward Crater Lake, was a long, single tone, solitary howl…much like I’ve heard in wolf country in Northern Minnesota or Alaska. It was pretty far away, but carried really well…this animal certainly had a good set of lungs!

The dogs heard it too, and it re-energized their singing. The distant howler and the sled dogs sang together for maybe a minute, then the winter stillness enveloped us all again.

Hope you can come for a visit here at Crystalwood Lodge and perhaps hear for yourself and offer your opinion as to what it is! And don’t forget to take advantage of our year-end booking special for 2011 to secure your private getaway anytime before 6/30/2012 (including holidays!)

We’ll be waiting for youuuuuuuuuuuu….  

Early Fall on the Upper Klamath National Wildlife Refuge at Crystalwood Lodge

Fall is arriving, picking up pace day by day. We had a light freeze on Sept. 1, heralding the start of our favorite season…so the dogs and I got out and did about a 4 mile training run on the property to celebrate!

Why is it our favorite season here at Crystalwood Lodge ?

Great temps, plenty of open space to romp around in.

Great fishing action, with trout and perch — the trout are going crazy over the hoppers.

Fall Colors at Crystalwood Lodge just outside Crater Lake National Park

Lots of colors…for the next several weeks the marsh and mountains will be an ever-changing palette of eye-candy.

No mosquitoes.

Warm days, crisp nights.

Quiet.

Time to pause, reflect, relax.

Not even too early to plan future adventures…we’ve hosted 2 weddings this summer, numerous family reunions and groups, and celebrations for Christmas, Thanksgiving, President’s Day, spring break…oh yea, and summer!

But fall is truly special…

Ripe elderberries cover the grounds at Crystalwood Lodge near Crater Lake

Fall fruits in abundance: the property and area is covered with wild choke cherry, wild strawberries and the omnipresent wild elderberries. It would be a shame to let the birds and animals snag them all!

No crowds.

Crater Lake is peaceful once again, with all the trails and roads open and ready for exploring. Ditto for the National Forest, BLM lands, Sky Lakes and Mountain Lakes Wildernesses…all waiting for you to explore, without having to deal with rain, snow, bugs or crowds. This is truly a special time of the year!

Warm days, crisp nights, choke cherries and the start of fall colors at Crystalwood Lodge

And…to help you celebrate this most wonderful of seasons here in Southern Oregon — a fall reservation special! Now until when the snow flies (usually sometime in mid-late November) we’re offering 3 rooms nights for the price of 2…book 2 nights and your third nights’ stay is free!

If you can only stay 2 nights, we’ll give you a 25% discount on a 2 night stay…but I’m betting once you get here and enjoy our fall panoramas and activities, you’ll change your mind and decide to stay that third night and take advantage of this super special.

The dogs and I will be waiting for you. Who knows…you may be lucky enough to tag along on one of our training runs!

Woo-wooooo!!!

Crystalwood Lodge, your pet friendly and family welcoming vacation rental destination near Crater Lake National Park is proud to be hosting not one but two weddings this summer. The first one was this past weekend.  Congratulations to Briana and Rory and their families!

Rory’s family and groomsmen stayed at Crystalwood for the weekend, and the happy couple spent their wedding night here as well. With the long summer days, many of the family took a quick trip to nearby Crater Lake after the ceremony and reception.

The reception was catered by Yummy’s Cowboy Catering (which was yummy!), and some of the kids visited with my sled dogs after the reception as well.  With plenty of parking available, it was easy to accommodate the ceremony and reception for over 100 guests.

  All in all, a great weekend! We’re getting 2012 reservations already for July, August and September, so make plans early to get your first choice of dates!  Family reunions and extended family trips still top the list of reasons to rent the entire lodge, but we’re also having Sierra Club trips, workshops, healing retreats and of course…weddings.

The dogs and I look forward to hosting YOU soon! You can click here to check Crystalwood Lodge availability. As always, I’m just a phone call away if you have more questions or prefer to talk to a human being to make your reservation:  (866) 381-2322.

Have a wonderful summer 2011!

A point to note:  Fall reservations guarantee you the absolutely best time to hike and explore this area in depth. This year we had unseasonably late snow in the mountains, resulting in most trails being snow-bound and closed until late in July. You are guaranteed easy and complete trail access throughout September and most of October…with the fall colors being an added bonus! I’m betting the colors will be awesome this season given all the snow and rain we had earlier in the spring.  We typically have about 6+ weeks of beautiful “Indian summer” during September and October — warm days, crisp nights, dry conditions, no bugs, beautiful ever-changing fall colors — my favorite time of year, can you tell? 

Crystalwood Lodge, your warm and cozy base for winter fun

We’re OPEN for Winter Play…plenty of snow, warm temps, Crater Lake is mantled in her winter glory, special winter-only events and activities coming up…and it isn’t even officially winter yet!

Brick Says...Come Visit Me!

First I should pass along a request from Brick…he wants you to know that he’d love some company, and please bring treats. Lots of them. As everyone knows who’s visited and been charmed by Brick, he’ll be the first to tell you I never, ever feed him and so he depends on handouts for his sustenance. (yeah, right). But he truly does love the busy summer season and visiting with guests, and takes his job of Crystalwood Lodge Official Meeter and Greeter quite seriously. He’s getting pretty frail now at 18 years young, so he’s slowed down quite a bit…but his nose certainly still works just fine!

What a magnificent early fall we had — drop dead gorgeous Indian Summer, with beautiful soft days, crisp nights, and as always it was a great time to hike and enjoy our natural wonders. I had the chance to explore a few miles of the Nannie Creek trail, just north of Crystalwood Lodge, which goes into the heart of the Sky Lakes Wilderness and connects with the Pacific Crest Trail. My good friend Karen came to visit, and we took advantage of the grand weather to check out the trail…

Looking North Toward Pelican Butte at the Nannie Creek Trail Overlook in the Sky Lakes Wilderness

Puck Lake off Nannie Creek Trail

Then, in November and early December…SNOW! Lots of it, much earlier than normal for this much snow — we usually get quite a bit to enjoy, but we had January type storms in November. I kept digging out to keep access to the Lodge easy and open, but once the dog yard did get kind of buried:

First Big Snow in the Iditarod Dog Yard at Crystalwood Lodge, Southern Oregon Cascades

Luckily the dogs love it and are good at keeping their circles stomped down and quite usable. With this much snow, and no base, it did mean we were grounded in our seasonal “no fly zone” — way too much snow to train the team using 4-wheelers, and no trails established to be able to safely run a sled.

But that is changing this week! The groomer is finally getting out on the trail system, and I expect we may be able to get out on the sled very soon. We’ve had quite a bit of rain in the last couple of weeks, which melted some of the snow and compacted the rest, so now terrific base conditions upon which we can build the rest of the winter with more snow.  Let it snow, let it snow!

Crystalwood Lodge Easy Winter Access

As a reminder, Crystalwood Lodge has easy winter access — I maintain the driveway and parking areas, the country keeps Westside Road well plowed since it is a country truck bypass route, and the state takes care of the main highways. I’ve never had guests who couldn’t get here…and in fact, we have served as an emergency way station for travellers from Klamath Falls to Medford. It is definitely recommended you bring chains or traction tires — we are in the mountains, so even when Crystalwood itself and Westside Road are perfectly open, you may need them for safe traveling over the higher passes on your way if a storm happens to blow in.

Crystalwood Lodge is located just outside the south entrance to Crater Lake National Park, which is the entrance open year-round. Crater Lake too has plenty of snow this year, so a great time to explore and feel like you have the Park to yourself. Additionally, there’s a number of upcoming winter-only events:

• Winter Wings Festival in February, celebrating the terrific birding available in the Klamath Basin, especially visiting the wintering bald eagles, the largest population in the lower 48 states. Workshops, field trips and activities for the whole family…mark your calendars and make plans to attend!

• Crystal Cave Tours at Lava Beds National Monument. Crystal Cave is only open on a limited basis during the winter months due to its delicacy. Tours are by reservation, only on winter Saturdays, and only 6 people are permitted per tour. Be sure not to miss out on this very exclusive adventure!

• Ranger led snowshoe hikes at the Rim of Crater Lake. Guided snowshoe hikes are every winter Sunday afternoon.

Snowshoe Paradise at Crystalwood Lodge

Don’t forget to plan a few extra days to explore Crystalwood itself — go sledding, snowshoe outside our front door on the Upper Klamath National Wildlife Refuge, and visit with the Iditarod sled dog team (yes, Brick will share, grudgingly…).  Be completely relaxed and on your own schedule, indulge and enjoy yourself in our fully outfitted commercial kitchen (all you bring is your food), and watch a movie or read a book while cuddling up by the wood stove in the Great Room. A winter vacation just doesn’t get any better than this!

Well, Are Ya Coming?

So what should I tell Brick? Will you be visiting him this winter?

Blustery Day First Snowfall 2010

If you’re interested in snowmobiling on some of the best trails and powder anywhere in the West (anywhere! West Yellowstone and Park City, eat your hearts out), OR finding all the solitude you could possibly hope for, the area around Crystalwood Lodge, on the south side of Crater Lake is just made for you. We’ve got several hundred miles of groomed multi-use trails, nordic only trails, wide open spaces to snowshoe, and more stars on a clear crisp night than you’ve ever seen. Our area is home to avid cross country skiers, dog sledders, snowshoers, snowmobilers, and lots of folks who just know how to have a good time outdoors this time of year.

Don’t forget the 4-legged members of your family — they love the snow too, and can really show you how to enjoy it!

Something for me?

The other option is always to curl up in front of the fire in our wood stove with a good book and some yummy hot cocoa…

Dogs get to curl up too on their own dog beds!

There’s still plenty of birds — several hundred species call the Klamath Basin home year-round, and winter is an especially good time to view eagles and other raptors. Plenty of wildlife out and about as well, and the snow makes it far easier to see their activity by spotting and following their tracks.

Bald Eagle in Tree

Avoid the crowds, avoid the conga lines of cars, avoid parking hassles, avoid the high resort prices and come share our winter wonderland. Of course, Crater Lake in the winter is unparalleled beauty…our winter wonderland adjoins the South Entrance to Crater Lake National Park, which is the entrance that is open year-round.

Snowcovered Tules and Mountains

You may have seen previous postings of the view from the Lodge overlooking Upper Klamath National Wildlife Refuge. It looked like this today, as you look east from the Lodge :

View across the marsh

Today was a beautiful day, so I went for a drive around 30 Mile Land, past the Wood River Wetlands and ended up at Agency Lake. Here’s the view looking back to the west, toward Crystalwood Lodge across Agency Lake.

Agency Lake and Cascades with Sky Lakes Wilderness

As you can see, the Sky Lakes Wilderness and the high country atop the Cascades are still snow-bound. In a year with a normal winter, that situation would continue perhaps even into July, but this year, I’m guessing the trails will open earlier than normal due to the light winter we had. Right now we’re having very mild spring days, so stay tuned for the hiking updates!

Last but not least, you can’t talk about spring around here without talking about birds. Hearing birds, seeing birds. Everywhere. The cliff swallows that grace the sides of the lodge and delight our guests are back as usual, and busy nesting and eating the emerging bug population. I tried to catch a few shots of them near sunset, as they congregate before calling it a day:

Flock of cliff swallows at Crystalwood Lodge

Flock of cliff swallows near Crystalwood Lodge nests

So there you have it. Birds, fishing, snow remnants, budding trees, marsh greening up, beautiful days…spring and summer are a very special fleeting time around here! Hope you have the chance to get away and enjoy it with us!!

Don’t forget…for a complete calendar of all there is to see and do around Crystalwood Lodge, make sure to check out our new local visitor website, Things To Do Near Crater Lake. An outgrowth of our award-winning local visitor newspaper, the website is a tremendous resource for the myriad of recreational opportunities and services in our area. More about that in an upcoming post!

Daffodils bring the promise of spring at Crystalwood Lodge

Daffodills welcome the longer warm spring days

The birds are definitely coming back early, the grass is greening up…can spring be far behind? Crystalwood Lodge and the Upper Klamath Basin near Crater Lake are gearing up for spring migration, fishing season opener and  looking forward to the long lazy days of summer! We welcome you to join us!

Ready for a little apres ski?

There are a number of winter activities close to our Klamath Falls lodging, but once the snows are here, it is most fun to strap snowshoes (or skis) to your feet and head out into the wilderness.  Our lodge sits on 130 acres of land, and has five miles of trails available just for guests. If you like to get a little exercise and fresh air, but don’t want to make a day of it, exploring the trails at the lodge is perfect. This allows ample time for lounging, soaking, eating and visiting.

The Fremont-Winema National Forests are adjacent to our land, making forays into the wilderness convenient. Crater Lake National Park is less than an hour away by car, making it another great option for a day in the snow.

Be sure to dress in warm layers, bring snacks and water, and know where you are going when you head out for the day. But what a day you will have!

This winter, rent our entire Klamath Falls lodge and enjoy great discounts to the individual room rate. Gather together good friends and family for a week or weekend of great fun. You can even bring your dogs, as we are a pet-friendly lodge!

It’s a win-win for everyone.  Your group of up to 16 can enjoy the entire Lodge and property and have it all to yourselves!  I am excited because this enables me to have the Lodge open this winter, for if folks come and rent the entire lodge for 3, 4 or 5 nights, it makes it economically viable for me to open it up and make it available.  We’re due to have a great winter, so make plans now to come and enjoy it!

As we have all season, a Lodge Exclusive rental comes with use of the fully outfitted commercial kitchen at no extra charge.  Of course, this means that one and only one group will be here at a time…so first come, first served!  If you’ve been thinking about having a family get-together for the holidays, or a group outing to enjoy Crater Lake National Park in all her winter glory, book now!  When its taken, its gone!

Since this is a new official offering for us (we’ve been doing Lodge Exclusives upon request for years), I’m offering some incredible deals to kick start the process.  The longer you rent the Lodge, the less per night it is.  The cost per night drops dramatically, depending on how many nights you need to explore all the recreation opportunities in our area!

For example, if you wanted to do a 2-night rental (our minimum) for a getaway weekend, the basic rate is $497/night (plus lodging tax), a savings of over $212/night from our per-room nightly rates.  However, if you wanted to have the Lodge as your Thanksgiving holiday getaway, say for 4 nights Wednesday – Saturday, the price per night drops to $347.  And if you wanted to have Crystalwood Lodge as your home for the holidays for the week of Christmas or New Years, your investment per night drops to $297!  NO holiday upcharge.  NO surcharge for high season rentals.  Just come and enjoy!

We’re still pet welcoming, and for those of you who’ve stayed with us before, Brick wanted me to tell you he is looking forward to some visitors, and please bring treats.  I think he’s afraid I might forget he’s retired and try to hook him up with the dog team when we go out.  Not likely! 

So whether you’re looking to book an artist workshop, family reunion, church retreat, scrapbooking weekend, adventure experience or just an incredibly private and utterly relaxing getaway with those closest to you…we look forward to hosting you, making sure everything is taken care of for you, and helping you create some extra special memories in our corner of paradise! Check availability and book now!