|
Tule Lake is the Center of the World
|
|
|
 |
|
|
The Modoc Indians that live there regard Tule Lake as the center of the earth. Today few main stream Americans have heard of it and those Californians that have will usually think of the place in terms of the Japanese-American internment during the Second World War. Very few people visit the lake and the region around it is very sparsely populated. I find it to be one of the most unusual and beautiful places imaginable.
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
It is hard to choose from among the many attractions Tule Lake holds for me, but in a strange way its very remoteness is one. It is a long drive from anywhere and you are aware of the vast distances in this part of the country as you gaze out through clean air for a hundred or more miles across lake and farm land. People live simply and, although they might be reluctant to admit it, are still close to the land in a spiritual and very practical way. Just about everyone seems to know everyone else.
|
|
 |
|
|
Birds abound in numbers and diversity that approach those seen by our ancestors a century or more ago. Tule Lake and its sister lakes in the gigantic Klamath drainage system are vital stopovers in the Great Pacific Flyway. An important Wildlife Refuge has been established adjacent to the lake and it contains protected nesting areas for a number of endangered species. (Birders, hunters and environmentalists are something of an exception to my comments above. Someone serious about birds does know of Tule Lake and recognizes it as a very important place.)
|
|
 |
|
|
|
The land in this corner of California is shaped in major part by volcanic activity. One of the very best places to learn about this elemental force is at the Lave Beds National Monument next door to the lake itself. Cinder cones, lava flows, ice caves and the best collection of pictographs and petroglyphs in California can be found here. In the turbulent nineteenth century, the Lava Beds were also the locale for one of the most intense, prolonged, and violent struggles in California between the Army of the United States and the Native Americans. It is a sad but important bit of history and one that makes me think about a lot of very fundamental and very complicated things.
|
|
 |
|
|
Water is obviously another important element that has shaped the region and it is essential to both the wildlife and the humans that live in the area. Petroglyph Point was once an island in an even larger lake that in earlier times inundated the region. The people that made these strange marks in the cliff traveled to the place in reed boats. Today a great controversy rages across the land about this vital life source and it quickly enters conversation with the local inhabitants - be they farmer or environmentalist.
|
|
 |
|
|
The town of Tule Lake is tiny - in fact, it is smaller than that. There are two places to stay overnight and two restaurants. Klamath Falls, 30 some miles to the north, has more diversity in both lodging and dining choices. During my most recent visit to Tule Lake I stayed at Fe's very comfortable and very reasonable Bed and Breakfast on Main Street and thoroughly enjoyed meeting the owner-operators Bob and Fe. When I next return to the area I will stay with them again. Birds get up early and I want to see them fly out from their nesting areas in the Wild Life Refuge.
|
|
|
Abecedarius, 10/03
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
