Crater Lake is the deepest lake in the entire country the pristine water in this collapsed volcano is so unbelievably blue it seems magical It cast such a spell on early visitors they named the cone in the center wizard Island I love the name wizard Island mhm it kind of evokes a little bit of mystery mystery is what brought me to this National Park in southern Oregon specifically a Mr tree I'd come to pay my respects to the old man of the lake it's an honor to meet you sir the old man of the lake was
first discovered in 1896 by Joseph Diller who is a geologist and Explorer and he described him as a spectacle curious enough to excite the imagination it may not look like much but this part of a tree has been part of this park since its Inception a 30t long log implausibly boobing upright for 120 years never the young man always the old man he's always been the old man of the lake he's like the Larry King of stumps he must have been young at some point we just don't know Mark penica is an aquatic ecologist for
the park as he monitors the water quality of Crater Lake he also so ends up monitoring the movements of the old man that's right this seemingly Unsinkable tree gets around you would think that the 4 foot above the water would act as a little sail but sometimes he'll move all the way across the lake Against the Wind it's as if he has a mind of his own the old man can travel miles in a single day today he's close to the shore tomorrow he could be in the middle of the lake in the 1930s the
government commissioned a study of his movements and their log of the log Rangers observed the old man move over 60 mil in less than 3 months the pilot was sealed into the 6ot acrylic bubble for the in the 1980s Mark Banica was part of a submarine exploration of Crater Lake to avoid running into the old man out in the water they tied him up on the shore bad idea it wasn't long after he was tied up that a storm blew in and the surface of the lake got too rough for us to deploy and recover
the submarine when it started to snow in August Superstition got the best of the scientists our senior scientists went out quietly one evening and released the old man from his bondage and when you know it the weather cleared up right afterwards as Jennifer Evans explains it's stories like that that have helped the old man take root in the imaginations of visitors he kind of became a bit of a a celebrity I guess of Greater Lake and inquiring minds want to know why hasn't the old man sunk rocks may have once weighed down the roots water
logging the bottom while the sun dried out the top but Mark penica isn't as concerned with the why I think maybe some questions should remain unanswered that maybe it's part of the human condition to believe even a little bit of mystery and the interconnectedness of all things so as a scientist you're okay with with maybe not knowing I'm okay with not knowing as the old man Bobs across the water perhaps that's what he's trying to teach us with his travels sometimes it's fun to be stumped
