Crater Lake National Park has, despite its relatively small size, got to be one of my favourite National Parks, despite only having visited it once, in winter.

However, nobody told me that July is the mosquito season in the Cascade Mountains in Oregon, and when they say mosquito season, they mean it!

At dusk, when I wanted to be photographing, there were literally swarms of them flying around. Approximately 25% of my photos have at least one blurry mosquito visible in the shot. Despite getting into the car as quickly as possible to move between locations, every time I would end up with 10–20 mosquitoes in there with me — thankfully with a convertible I could drop the roof and drive off, before screeching to a halt half a mile down the road and quickly putting the roof back up!

To say I was rather itchy for the next few days would be an understatement.

Despite all that, I highly recommend anyone passing anywhere near Crater Lake National Park to go — even in July — as it’s absolutely spectacular. I’m not sure I did a very good job of capturing that here, as I could feel my sanity slipping away while trying to shoot through a black mist!

Oh, and to just drive me that little bit more crazy, I managed to drop my remote shutter release on the way back to the car, necessitating me to retrace my steps in the dark with a torch to find it an hour later.