Travel

September 1, 2024August 31, 2024

Preserving the Season

A couple of things this week, Steelhead and seasonal fruit canning.

If you’re a regular on this blog, you might recall we’ve combined trips for Summer Steelhead on the Lower Deschutes and orchard visits before.

Well, it’s that time of year again. Fishermen refer to Steelhead as a fish of a thousand casts. It can take that many or more to actually catch one.

Our favorite stretch of the Deschutes River.

In simple terms, this is a Rainbow Trout smolt that spent a few years in the ocean and then comes back to the fresh water river of it’s birth to spawn and repeat the cycle.

Late summer on the Lower Deschutes offers a chance to add to your cast number in pursuit of large fish. Mostly, I’ve been trying out fly patterns, improving my casting skills, and a little more.

This week I did manage to hook up a large fish, but lost it before a positive identification. In a week, I’ll try again. The Lower Deschutes Canyon in late summer is worth the trip.

Suncrest peaches feature in a new recipe, Ginger Peach Butter

August and September are huge canning months as farms and orchards overflow with new harvests. We eat “seasonally” which requires the preservation of some of what you are enjoying at the moment.

Pickling and fermenting are on this month’s menu

Stone fruit have started to show up at the Hood River orchards so that is what we gathered extra of this week. Peaches, plums and some crabapples are getting sliced for breakfast today and loaded into jars for meals this winter.

Tree ripened fruit from the farmstand outshines anything you’ll find at the mega-mart. It is always worth the trip.

August 11, 2024August 8, 2024

Third Time’s the Charm

An early morning start had us heading towards Paisley and the Chewaucan River.

It’s the third time we’ve attempted this loop route (previously stymied by snowy roads and a knee injury).

Paisley is on the southeastern end of Summer Lake, but first we headed to Lake Abert just a few miles further.

Both of these alkali bodies offer a stop over for migrating birds. The largest concentrations occur in July and August, so it seemed like a good time to swing by.

The lake’s calm surface creates an interesting illusion

In addition to a huge variety of gulls, we spotted Black-necked stilts, Phalaropes, as well as Avocets, both feeding and nesting.

US 395 runs the along the eastern edge and there are frequent turn outs to give you a great view of the mudflats.

Abert looking south from one of many pull-outs.

While we have been here before, the lake’s water level has never been this high, and by assumption that made for higher numbers of birds.

The background gets enhanced by the smoke haze.

A plume of smoke moved through the valley, but we managed to avoid the worst of it, grabbing some images before heading back to Paisley.

What little water makes it past the alfalfa irrigation and into Lake Abert Lake is from the Chewaucan River.

Paisley, home of the Mosquito Festival, sits on the river’s edge.

We turned onto a forest service road that follows the river up the southern end of Winter Ridge . . . a point from which John Freemont “discovered” the Summer Lake Valley.

Some fire scarred trees along the Chewaucan River

Ironically, the west side of this forested mountain range was consumed in a massive wildfire (Bootleg Fire, 365k acres) in the summer of 2021.

The understory shows signs of recovery, but blackened tree skeletons stand in memorial to the devastation.

Interesting point about wildland fire is how the fingers of a blaze reach into portions of a forest and miss adjacent areas.

The lower reaches of the Chewaucan were on the edge and our route wound in and out of the burned areas. At some high points you get a feel for the expanse of it.

We pulled into a quiet camp site for a lunch break, then continued to head up Winter Ridge. We skirted the edge of Gearhart Mt. Wilderness, and forged on to Bly and the Sprague River Valley.

On the way we discovered an unusual memorial from WWII, the Mitchell Monument Historical site. Apparently, the Japanese attempted to use High-altitude balloons to start fires in an effort to kill US citizens.

The Mitchell family and a group of Sunday school children were the sole casualties from an estimated 9000 balloons launched.

The USFS route out of the hills was a pothole riddled mess, but once we hit Bly, the roads improved and we had a very enjoyable journey along the slow moving Sprague River.

We then joined up with Highway 97 and cruised back up towards Bend.

August 4, 2024August 3, 2024

A Day Trip

At times these past few weeks, it seemed that all of Oregon was burning. So this week we attempted to see if that was true.

It’s not. At least not the entire state.

However, here in the high desert we are regularly covered in a plume of smoke.

We began our trip before dawn . . . an early start to a long loop route.

First stop, Cottonwood Canyon Day Use with enough time for some small mouth bass fishing.

This is one of our favorite spots,. Set in a canyon on the last few miles of the John Day, the river meanders across the northern third of the state.

Upstream, the John Day River, at Cottonwood Canyon SP

The morning was mostly smoke-free with cool morning temperatures.

Sharing lunch with local wildlife

The day use space at Cottonwood was empty and offered plenty of shade. We set up chairs and took in the quiet.

The next leg was east toward Service Creek, another point along the river.

This brought us to the western edge of a group of active wildfires, Lone Rock (137k acres), Monkey Creek (176k acres), and Courtrock (20k acres).

The turn south at Service Creek was literally the last piece of Highway 19 east still open.

There are always interesting bits of geology along Oregon highways

It was as far as we intended to go, but we did cross our fingers that we’d be able to get on State 207 and find a route to Mitchell.

By the time we’d pass Waldron Schoolhouse , the smoke had cleared and the traffic was light. We enjoyed the drive down to the Twickenham Road and the eastern border of Sutton Mountain.

At Mitchell we connected with Highway 26, and then took a short detour to visit the Painted Hills Unit.

We’ve been there numerous times, but this is a stop that is always worth the effort.

From there it’s back onto 26 over Ochoco Pass and dinner at the Tastee Treet.

A burger dinner on the Crooked River seemed a good way to end our day.

June 16, 2024June 16, 2024

A Mountain Loop

Davis Lake with Mt. Washington in the background

We spent this week under a heat dome. Not as bad as the southwest, but still a snow-melting stretch of weather. So we toured the Cascade Lakes Highway.

The edge of a lava flow, Jack & Tip for scale

We do this loop a couple of times a year, that is, the whole route around Bachelor. Sunriver to Crescent.

In this case, the opposite direction is a great early summer drive with lots of places to stop, walk around, and take photos.

Davis, Wickiup, and Crane Prairie are full from runoff, which is better than it’s been the last few years.

Most of the snow has receded to the highest points. We’ve made this trip in late May and snow banks frequently line the highway . . . but not this time.

Near the head waters of the Deschutes River

The meadows and marshes are a vibrant green, but not yet filled with wildflowers. That will have to be another trip.

Typically one of the stops is just below Lava Lake, at the head waters of the Deschutes River. However, the stop was brief as the mosquitoes were thick and hungry.

The closer you get to Bachelor, the more cars are encountered, so we rarely venture past Lava Lake.

The summer fishing is good and the shade is cool along the Upper Deschutes, as summers heat comes on full roar.

June 2, 2024June 5, 2024

A Different Road Taken

Looking south from refuge toward Summer Lake

The Fremont Highway will take you right by Summer Lake, so we drive that route frequently. Usually only as far as the refuge, but this week we kept on going.

Past the southern end of Summer Lake sits the tiny town of Paisley. If you stay on Highway 31 for another 30 miles you’ll run into 395 and that eventually gets you to Reno, Nevada.

Instead, we took a hard right in the middle of Paisley, heading up into the Fremont Forest along the Chewaucan River.

The initial plan was to run up the back side of Winter Ridge and come out at Silver Lake.

The Chewaucan is a beautiful little stream, we’ll definitely be back to fish. We’d explored the northern portion out to Fremont Point and got a spectacular view of Summer Lake Valley

The Chewaucan River cuts through a meadow

The canyon cut by the Chewaucan winds south through pine forests, past numerous camp sites and side creeks, eventually running into USFS 28. This road traverses the top of Winter Ridge and would, in theory, lead to Silver Lake.

I say in theory because we didn’t calculate snow pack and got turned back by blocked roadways.

Plans changed and we headed south to Dairy Creek and around Quartz Mountain intent on meeting up with State 140, Klamath Falls Highway. Foiled again by snow covered roadways, we retraced our route.

Undaunted, we’ll return to this area and complete the loop once the snowy grip of winter has been removed.