21 minute read
Crater Lake National Park
When 12,000-foot high Mount Mazama blew its top in southern Oregon 7,700 years ago, 12 cubic miles of fiery rock and gas exploded 30 miles high and spread out over thousands of square miles – so extreme that it entered the legends of the Pacific Northwest Native Americans. The volcano collapsed in on itself, leaving the mountain without a peak.
Over the centuries, the deep basin filled with water, its steep slopes gashed by a riot of color, where few trees could gain a toehold. Subsequent smaller eruptions further changed the landscape of what would become Crater Lake National Park, first “discovered” in 1853 by prospectors, but long a sacred place for Native Americans.
Invisible Beauty
Crater Lake looks like any other shaggy-topped mountain from a distance. Approaching from the south entrance through the Klamath Valley, there is nothing to suggest it’s something extraordinary until you begin to ascend into the park and see volcanic evidence in the canyons that flank the roadsides where rivers have sliced through ancient pyroclastic flows. Pinnacles – ancient fumaroles – protrude like lost stalagmites from the ground, hinting at something unusual.
It’s when you reach the rim that your jaw drops. The country’s deepest lake (1,943 feet), 21 square miles wide, and 33 miles round, shimmers back at you. On a sunny day, it glows an incredible sapphire, dimming to slate when clouds crowd the sky. No rivers feed it – only rain and snow. The view is spectacular.
The best way to take it all in is the twisting 33-mile Rim Drive that encircles the lake. It takes several hours as you stop among the more than 50 turnouts to read the informational signs and overlook the crater from different vantage points. I recommend the “Road Guide to Crater Lake”, which you can pick up at the Visitor Center, which highlights the best points to visit while providing fascinating insights onto the region.
Geologic Diversity
The variety of rock formations and types of stone are geology at its finest. Sunshine brings out a riot of color, from the lake to the slopes, edging everything in diamond brilliance. The whole
park is a hiker’s heaven, with trails ranging from easy to strenuous.
Some, such as the Lady of the Woods Loop, Castle Wildflowers, Pinnacles and Godfrey Glen, are less visited, enabling you to see unique features of the park, and finer details of volcanic eruptions. Sun Notch Trail is the ideal blend of hiking through a lush wildflower-laden meadow to a breathtaking edge-of-the-crater trail with the best of views of the Phantom Ship, a spired protrusion peeking above the lake’s waters.
Wizard Island, clad in ancient old-growth forest, can only be reached by a booked-in-advance boat cruise. It is one of several lava domes that formed after the eruption, but the only one that shows above lake level. Named for its similarity to a sorcerer’s pointed hat, it’s a focal point in the lake, and a popular hiking place.
Nearby is the Devil’s Backbone, a charcoal serrated spine of rock that plunges into the icy blue waters. A hike up The Watchman, an 8,056-foot peak, provides extraordinary views, as does Cloudcap and Garfield Peak. Glacial scarring that preceded Mazama’s collapse can be seen on rock remnants that survived the blast.
Hub of Crater Lake
The Visitors Center is the lake’s tourist hub, with a shop and cafeteria complex, interpretive exhibits and an information center. From there you can take a Rim Drive Trolley Tour instead of driving, and book a boat cruise. Close by is the Sinott Memorial, a small museum perched on a rock ledge with a panoramic view.
Crater Lake Lodge is part of the complex, and worth a visit. Originally built in 1909 as a version of a European hunting lodge, cheap construction and heavy snows took their toll, and in 1989 it was deemed unsafe and closed. However, The Historic Preservation League of Oregon was determined to save the building, and after a $15 million rehabilitation, which returned the exterior appearance and interior public areas to the late 1920s, it re-opened in 1995. Some of the original materials were salvaged for re-use, but very little could be saved. Wandering around inside, you would not know it is a recreation.
Some Things to Know
The park’s peak tourist seasons runs from June-October or until the first snows close the Rim Drive. With the park averaging 533 inches of snow a year, skiing and snowshoeing are popular. The short season means reservations for Crater Lake Lodge and nearby Annie Creek Campgrounds usually need to be made at least a year in advance.
Check at the Visitors Center for road closures. Landslides and road reconstruction can limit or close sections of the road for days at a time. Note that getting to the cruise boats requires a strenuous hike to and from Cleetwood Cove Trail; it is the only access to the lake’s shore. Plan for weather – sunshine is no guarantee. During my visit, it rained, hailed and snowed – in early August! ●
For the most up-to-date information on the park, visit https://www.nps.gov/crla/index.htm.
Manteca
By DENNIS WYATT
Half Moon Bay — the self-proclaimed “Pumpkin Capital of the World” — is a lightweight compared to Manteca.
Unless you’re into 800-pound monster pumpkins that you need a crane to move, Half Moon Bay isn’t where the action is at. It’s Manteca.
Almost 80 percent of California’s commercial pumpkin crop is grown in the fields around Manteca as well as Tracy and Stockton. On any given day during the harvest season 90 semi-truckloads carrying more than 40 different varieties of pumpkins to market throughout California and the western states roll from three pumpkin and melon brokers in the Manteca-Ripon area — Perry & Sons as well as Van Groningen & Sons in Manteca and Dan R. Costa in Ripon.
Last year Manteca area farmers grew 59,900 tons of pumpkins with a wholesale value of $24.8 million.
The next largest pumpkin growing area in the state is Hemet in Southern California.
While pumpkins seem to be able to grow anywhere, commercially they can’t match the color and hardness of those harvested from San Joaquin County fields.
That’s because of the perfect combination of soil — clay loam — combined with blistering hot days accompanied by cooling Delta breezes overnight.
“The soil and weather with the hot days and cool night breezes produces the best pumpkins and the sweetest fruit,” noted Art Perry of Perry & Sons that has been in the melon and pumpkin business since 1925.
The sweetest reward for Perry isn’t shipping top of the line melons to market. It’s the truckloads of pumpkins that his family grows and the pumpkins he brokers for other farmers.
“I love growing pumpkins,” Perry said. “It makes people happy. It makes children happy. Watching kids go up and hug a pumpkin is joy to see.”
PERRY & SONS PUMPKINS STARTED ON HANDSHAKE
Perry’s grandfather — Delfino Perry had no idea he was planting the seeds 96 years ago for what would become the West Coast’s largest melon brokering and growing firms.
He was just pursuing his dream of pursuing a better life in America with the aim of keeping family together and faith in God strong.
Today that dream is going strong as
three generations work side-by-side year round bringing farmers and retailers together by growing, brokering and distributing a wide repertoire of melons including watermelons and pumpkins.
Delfino left the Azores in 1906 via Ellis Island. He ended up in California in 1906 first landing in San Luis Obispo and then Oakland and eventually making his way to Modesto before settling in Manteca.
He started a small dairy on Jack Tone Road and started growing sweet potatoes, pumpkins, and watermelon. His brother farmed on Brunswick Road where the Perry & Sons main yard is now located just north of Manteca next door to the Delta College farm.
Art started working on the farm at an early age. His father George Sr. kept having to stop and get off and on his tractor while working the field. That is what prompted George Sr. to teach 5-year-old Art how to drive the tractor so he could be more efficient doing his work.
George Perry & Sons’ pumpkin business was born on a handshake with the late Antone Raymus. George Sr. wanted to farm acreage that Raymus owned near the old Summer Home School on Cottage Avenue.
They came to an agreement that Raymus would get a share of the crop receipts as payment for use of the land. When George Sr. wanted to put it in writing, Raymus refused, noting that a handshake was good enough for him.
“A lot of farmers — even big ones— still do business that way today,” Art said. “You’ve got to always do the right thing.”
It is that philosophy of “doing the right thing” by customers that has made the name “Perry & Son” synonymous with quality and dependability among clients ranging from chain stores to chain restaurants.
George Perry & Sons has come a long way since George Sr. planted his first four acres of pumpkins in 1958. Back then, the pumpkins and melons were tossed into the back of a truck and dropped off at markets. Today, family members equipped with smartphones and accessing i-Trade on the Internet grow, sell, and broker enough melons to keep trucks rolling daily to markets up and down the West Coast as well as Canada.
FRIENDLY FEUD BETWEEN GROWERS
IN HALF MOON BAY & MANTECA
And while Manteca can’t compete with Half Moon Bay for size — the winner of the annual weigh-in in 2017 set a North America record of 2,363 pounds — it leaves Half Moon Bay in the dust for tonnage. Besides, the gigantic pumpkins in Half Moon Bay are rarely grown there.
Given what comes from the fields around Manteca, you can understand why local growers were a bit miffed back in the 1970s when Half Moon Bay first proclaimed itself the pumpkin capital of the world.
That prompted Manteca farmers to start an informal “pumpkin fair” a few hours at Library Park that consisted of some kids’ games, a belly dancer that first year, bales of hay and a small mountain of pumpkins. They also openly challenged Half Moon Bay’s claim. That led to the “friendly feud” between the two communities being a featured cover story in People magazine.
That original event ultimately made orange the color of money for Manteca non-profits.
Thanks to the Manteca Pumpkin Fair staged by the Sunrise Kiwanis more than $1 million has gone to non-profits from money the service club has generated since taking over the fair 35 years ago. That’s in addition to money estimated at $400,000 that other non-profits have raised at their own booths over the years at the festival that takes place the first weekend in October. ●
IF YOU GO
MANTECA PUMPKIN FAIR
The 36th annual Manteca Pumpkin Fair will be held Oct. 2 and 3 in downtown Manteca. The free admission event is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. both days. There will be food, vendors, a community stage, a beer booth, and a kids’ zone on both days. On Oct. 2 there will be a tractor show, a pumpkin carving contest at 6 p.m. and a movie at 7 p.m. A car show will be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Oct. 3.
By KRISTINA HACKER
One of the best things about fall for coffee lovers is the return of pumpkin spice lattes. There’s just something about the smell and taste of a pumpkin pie added to coffee that makes fall mornings extra special.
Most drinks with ‘pumpkin spice’ in their name include cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, allspice and cloves — or some variation of those spices traditionally used in making a pumpkin pie. LaMo Café in Turlock takes the traditional PSL to the next level with all natural ingredients and locally brewed coffee.
“What makes our coffee shop I think so special is that every syrup that you get here and you add to any of your beverages is all made from scratch. Nothing is made with anything weird in it — no preservatives, no high fructose corn syrup; everything’s made with pure cane sugar, real milk, real whatever it is,” said LaMo owner Hillary Smith.
— Hillary Smith
The LaMo staff makes up the specialty drink mixes several times every week so that they are fresh, said Smith. Their PSL features pumpkin puree that is simmered with pumpkin pie spices, real vanilla (from the bean), real brown sugar and water.
“We simmer and simmer and it gets this really nice deep flavor and you can add that to espresso to make it a latte or you can add it to cold brew or you can add it to chai to make a pumpkin chai latte,” said Smith.
Their specialty drink recipes are created in their home kitchens by trial and error.
“Most of our recipes, actually all of them, are just by taste because we cook so much. My sister and I and our manager Bree kind of know what’s going to go into something even without looking at a recipe so we just with trial and error created this,” said Smith.
Along with their handcrafted mixes, LaMo Café uses locally brewed coffee from El Camino Coffee Roasters in Oakdale and Mast Coffee in Sacramento.
The founder of El Camino Coffee Roasters is a former LaMo barista, said Smith.
“All of our coffee is fresh. If you go to most big-name corporate coffee shops, they roast who knows how old beans; they could be six months old. All of our beans, we like to sell and serve them within a few weeks so they’re really fresh and so the oils are still on the coffee. Nothing has a rancid taste, which you don’t realize that we get so used to that taste at all these big coffee shops here, you’re never going to have that flavor. It’s all really fresh, the oils are fresh everything and we do not serve coffee past several weeks old,” said Smith. To go along with their freshly-made coffee and tea drinks, LaMo also has an in-house baker. Smith highly recommends the pumpkin loaf, apple spice cupcakes and the shop’s signature macaroons (when available).
A fall trip to LaMo for a PSL and a sweet treat can be enjoyed on the café’s outdoor covered patio, which features heat lamps for comfort during chilly days. ●
IF YOU GO
GETTING THERE:
LAMO CAFÉ 310 E. Main St., Turlock
CONTACT:
209 632-6655 www.lamocafe.co
Cover’s is as right as apple pie
By SABRA STAFFORD
When a fire blazed through Cover’s Apple Ranch operating facility in 2000, it seemed like the family apple business that had become a Tuolumne attraction had seen its last day.
“We came really close to saying ‘it was fun, but we’re not rebuilding,” said Ben Cover, the family business spokesman. “If it hadn’t been for the outpouring from the community and the people coming by and asking us to rebuild, we probably wouldn’t have rebuilt.”
As it turns out, the fire was the best thing that could have happened for the business.
“The fire was probably the best single thing that happened,” Cover said. “We could not have done there what we have been able to do here.”
Two years after the fire Cover’s Apple Ranch re-opened, only now it was on the other side of Cherokee Road. Now, more than two decades later the site is a favorite stop for locals and visitors - all eager to bite down into the delectable apple pies or one of the other treats that the family has perfected.
“Everything is fresh,” Cover said. “We don’t bake, freeze and then warm up. They are baked the morning of and as needed throughout the day. They are like what you remember your grandmother baking.”
When thinking of the produce that comes out of California, apples would not be anywhere near the top of the list. But there was a time when Tuolumne County was known as a prime place for growing apples and the apples were highly valued. Many of the apple trees at Cover’s Apple Ranch were planted close to a hundred years ago. Every fall, it offers a selection of Arkansas Black, Common Red Delicious, Early Blaze, Golden Delicious, Winesap, Red and Yellow Bartlett, Winter Nellis. They also grow Bosc Pears.
Over the years the ranch passed from one owner to the next. Louis and Evelyn Sonka purchased the property in 1971 and they had the idea to bake apple pies and sell them at the site, along with fresh pressed cider. Their enterprise proved so popular that it continued to be called Sonka’s even after they had sold it.
In 1998, the property was once again up for sale and was being considered by a group of developers. Having grown up next door to the property, the Cover family - Joe and Carol Cover, along with their six sons, purchased Sonka’s Apple Ranch. Joe is the younger brother of former owner Rudy Cover and once again the property became known as Cover’s Apple Ranch.
The site, in addition to the production facility where apples are peeled and pressed, has a restaurant that serves breakfast and lunch, a bakery, a gift shop, a mini train that traverses the property, a barnyard petting area, a duck pond and serene grounds to relax for the day.
“It’s a calm spot to come and visit,” Cover said.
While visitors may enjoy the attractions, the real stars of the ranch are the apples and what is made of them. This includes pies, turnovers, dumplings, cider, butter, sauces and lots more delectable treats, including seasonal offerings using other fruits.
“Everything is made here and it’s all made from scratch,” Cover said.
Some of the most popular options are the Dutch Apple Pie and the Mile High Apple Pie.
“We stack up the apples in that one,” Cover said.
They sell apple pies year-round and fall is their busiest season. Those wanting to purchase specific pies, especially for Thanksgiving, are advised to place orders a week in advance before going to the ranch.
Cover’s Apple Ranch is located at 19211 Cherokee Road in Tuolumne. They are open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday and closed Sunday and Monday. For orders or more information call (209) 928-4689 or visit their website at coversappleranch.com. ●
—Ben Cover
By KRISTINA HACKER
California’s agricultural abundance includes more than 400 commodities. Over a third of the country’s vegetables and two-thirds of the country’s fruits and nuts are grown in the Golden State. In season right now are apples, figs, pears, cauliflower, kale, snap peas and winter squash, to name just a few. Fall is the perfect time to use locally grown produce in your weeknight and holiday dishes. Here are two fall favorites for your menu:
Pomegranates
California produces 99% of the pomegranates in the U.S. Pomegranates have been cherished for their exquisite beauty, flavor, color, and health benefits for centuries. Pomegranates have many health benefits from helping to reduce the chance of cancer to being a source of Vitamin C and dietary fiber.
Blueberry and Pomegranate Power Bars
Yield: 12 bars
Nonstick cooking spray 8 cups popped popcorn 1 1/2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats 1 cup dried blueberries 1/2 cup pomegranate seeds 1/2 cup whole natural almonds, toasted and coarsely chopped 2/3 cup honey 2/3 cup light brown sugar 2 tablespoons butter or margarine 6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, melted Line 13-by-9-inch pan with foil; spray with nonstick cooking spray. In large bowl, combine popcorn, oats, blueberries, pomegranate seeds and almonds. In small saucepan over low heat, boil honey, brown sugar and butter 2 minutes. Pour over popcorn mixture and mix thoroughly. Using damp hands, press mixture firmly into prepared pan. Refrigerate until firm, about 2 hours. Cut into 12 bars. Dip bottoms of bars into melted chocolate. Place on wax paper-lined pan; refrigerate until ready to serve. Store in tight covered container in refrigerator.
Sweet potatoes
High in nutrients and low in calories, sweet potatoes are a designated superfood. They’re also fat- and cholesterol-free and a great source of dietary fiber which, among other things, can help you feel full and satisfied longer. They are also very versatile. Sweet potatoes can be baked, boiled, broiled, grilled, fried, steamed, sautéed, and pureed. They work in sweet and savory dishes, in everything from summery salads to wintery stews, and in all kinds of recipes and cuisines.
Savory Sweet Potato Waffles with Garlic Crème Fraîche
Ingredients
Waffle Batter 2 medium (1 1/4 lbs or 565 g) sweet potatoes 1 3/4 cup (245 g) all-purpose flour 1/4 cup (35 g) cornstarch 4 teaspoon baking powder 1 ounce Pecorino Romano cheese, grated (see headnote above for substitution) 2 green onions, finely chopped 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt 1/2 teaspoon fresh ground pepper 1 1/2 cups whole milk 1/4 cup (57 g) unsalted butter, melted 2 large eggs, separated 2 medium garlic cloves, grated or minced Garlic Crème Fraîche 1 medium garlic clove, grated or minced 1 small shallot, grated or minced zest and juice of 1 medium lemon 1/2 cup crème fraîche (see headnote above for substitution) 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt 1/2 teaspoon fresh ground pepper For Garnish (optional) 1 green onion, sliced diagonally
Directions
1. Peel and chop the sweet potatoes into 1-inch cubes and put in a steamer basket. Place the steamer basket in a pot of simmering water (making sure the basket isn’t submerged in the water) and cover. Steam sweet potatoes for 18-20 minutes or until they are tender with a fork. Empty the sweet potatoes into a bowl and mash with a fork. You can do this a day ahead and just refrigerate the sweet potatoes (unmashed or already mashed). 2. While the sweet potatoes are cooking, make the garlic crème fraîche by placing the garlic, shallots, lemon zest and juice in a small bowl. Let sit for 10 minutes for the garlic and shallots to soften, then stir in the crème fraîche, salt and pepper. Cover and refrigerate while you make the rest of the batter. 3. Place the flour, cornstarch, baking powder, cheese, green onions, salt and pepper in a large bowl and stir with a balloon whisk until all ingredients are evenly distributed. Place 1 cup of the mashed sweet potatoes (reserve the remaining sweet potatoes for another use), milk, butter, egg yolks, and garlic in a small bowl and stir with a balloon whisk until well blended. Place the egg whites in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment and whip until soft peaks form. 4. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and fold together with a large spatula. Once the dry ingredients are mostly incorporated, add the beaten egg whites and fold until a batter forms. 5. Heat your waffle iron and cook the waffles as per your machine’s instructions. Serve with garlic crème fraîche and garnish with green onion slivers.
Makes 5 to 6 Belgian-style waffles.
