Ten thousand years ago, Fort Rock was prime real estate for cave-dwelling families, with plentiful food and a great lake where the site stands. This giant tuff ring preserves evidence of a changing ancient lake whose wind-driven waves eroded Fort Rock’s walls, cutting notches and terraces into the stone; each notch marks a prehistoric shoreline, ancient beaches separated by thousands of years. At the lake’s deepest, this place lay under 183 feet of water. Though rugged in appearance, the Fort Rock area is fragile, and its trails provide close views of a living landscape where sagebrush, native grasses, and colorful wildflowers share the basin with deer, coyotes, reptiles, and many of the foods they depend on, while rock cliffs shelter a rich mix of birds, some seldom seen elsewhere in Oregon.