Category: Travel

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Fossils, rocks and turkeys

Being retired we find time to embrace certain concepts or more like Rules to Live By. They help us focus on what’s really important and among them are:

    • Fun will be had by all
    • Live life like my dog 
    • Housework never supersedes fun

However, today we plan to use the Never Go Back The Same Way We Came rule. After a wonderful morning and lunch at Spring Basin Wilderness, we continue our exploration of the area.

We head along a scenic drive to explore the prehistoric past of Oregon and stop at the Clarno Unit of the John Day Fossil Beds. It is located 18 miles west of the town of Fossil, Oregon.

The Palisades are the most prominent landform and are ancient mudflows.

The trailhead is located along Highway 218. The Trail of Fossils (¼ mile loop) is the only trail in the park where visitors can easily see fossils in the rocks. Large boulders strewn below the Palisades contain dozens of visible plant fossils. We glimpse fossilized plants along the cliff walls as well … when suddenly we hear a strange “gobble” sound. I kid you not! We grab the binoculars and sure enough it’s a flock of wild turkeys. What a perfect end to a perfect day.

Sure, we get home late. But luckily we’ve put into practice our Always have dinner ready and waiting after a long day on the road rule.  On the menu, Minestrone Soup with toasted baguette. Yeah … these are rules we can live by.

 

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A view and a warning

Oregon Trunk Railroad Bridge

Located just north of Redmond, the Peter Skene Ogden Park is the perfect stop if you’re heading south. A rest area that features three bridges spanning the Crooked River gorge. The railroad bridge that is about 100 years old, a highway bridge no longer in use, and the new bridge.

Oregon Trunk Railroad bridge is a steel arch built in 1910. Workers climbed rope ladders and waded through the river to get to the other side. Later, 300 feet above the gorge, they would “walk the plank,” crossing over on narrow boards that bounced with each step.

The Crooked River High Bridge allows pedestrians to walk the 464 feet over the Crooked River gorge to some dizzying views of sheer basalt walls leading down the 300 foot canyon face.

Also, if you are so inclined, there is a platform set up for bungee jumping.

Speaking of jumping … one alarming note…there  were many signs posted on the path to the gorge’s edge. They all offered a very explicit warning about the fate of many dogs (gulp).

Needless to say. I left both Tip and Jack in the car.

 

 

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A stop in Warm Springs

Deschutes River, near Warm Springs

This year winter was three weeks long and started four weeks ago. On Feb. 24 there was four feet of snow in our front yard. Today that is down to about six inches. Not complaining. We enjoyed winter and three weeks was a nice amount.  But when you are looking for hiking opportunities, this amount of snow makes that difficult. So our weekly excursions kind of stopped.

Road trips started back up this week and the other day we headed up to Warm Springs to check out “The Museum at Warm Springs.” 

Located just over the Deschutes River on Highway 26, the Bureau of Indian Affairs established a reservation school in 1890, on the site of the Warm Springs Agency. The settlement that developed around this is an unincorporated city or census-designated place.  A 1855 treaty ceded 10 million acres of traditional Indian  lands to the United States, keeping only the portion we now call the Warm Springs Indian reservation. The Indian Reorganization act allowed the Warm Springs, Wasco and Paiute Indians to establish a tribal government and take over control of the reservation land.

Beaded Bag Courtesy of The Museum of Warm Springs Permanent Collection

To preserve the language and culture of these tribes, in 1993 the confederated tribes opened The Museum at Warm Springs. This beautiful rock and brick building serves as a central point in sharing not just the historical aspects, but also educational and artistic views.

The collection of baskets and bead work is worth the trip but there are also changing exhibits and on this visit we were treated to art from K to 12 students. The exhibit was great! These were class projects and most of them centered on native culture themes and made use of mostly recycled objects with a focus on traditional crafts and customs.

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Found a great Public House

Oregon has lots of places to find craft brews. So many, there is often little difference between one or the other. Faced with way too many Indian Pale Ale  and seasonal brews …sorry but pumpkin spice is really only palatable in scone form… we are always looking for something different coming out of the tap. This can be a brew style or even how the beer is being delivered to the glass.

The pints poured in your local establishment are likely moved by carbon dioxide, a practice that adds to the effervescence of the pint and sometimes, can be a bit too much. If you’re lucky your local watering spot offers nitro or nitrogen gas-powered lines. Nitro is less bitter and adds smaller bubbles to the drink.

A better way to have your pint without all the bubbles is to use a British style hand pump or beer engine.  A traditional British public house tap uses a lever’s energy to move beer from the keg to the glass. This style of beer delivery usually means the final fermentation was in the cask.

Hand pump pours are, in my mind, superior pints leaving just the cast conditioned character of the beer in the glass and a creamy froth on top.

We were really pleased to find Porter Brewing in Redmond, where they only serve cast conditioned beer hand pulled.

The Porter is pleasantly smoky, the stout chocolatey, and my favorite the Extra Special Bitter which was better than the nitro ESB at Red Hook.

In addition to the tap offerings, there is a BBQ food truck adjacent that offers great pub food. We’ll be passing Bend more often to hit this great little english pub on the north end of Redmond.

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Geological structures

In Central Oregon you are at the mercy of winter’s weather whims.

Sun-filled days are broken up with snowfall which makes road trips unpleasant. Right now we are in the middle of a February snow-dump and have spent the last week close to home. When the roads, as well as the sky cleared, we were ready for an excursion.

East of La Pine, about 40 miles on the Fremont Highway (State Route 31), is according to our trusty Oregon Roadside Geology book,  a “garden of volcanic oddities.” Big Hole, Hole-in-the-Ground, The Devils Garden and Fort Rock were all formed about 13 thousand years ago in and along an ice-age lake that became Silver and Summer lakes. Basically, at the same time Mt Mazama was making Crater Lake.

Geological spectacles are usually enough to pique our interest, but just a few weeks ago we discovered that Fort Rock State Park was also a destination for birders.  In particular, you’ll find falcons and eagles using the unique structures of Fort Rock to launch hunting missions across the prairie and farm fields to the east.

 

The state park at it’s northwestern edge is the starting point for a series of trails that take you into the ring of volcanic ash and around it’s outer perimeter.

This scouting mission didn’t align with optimal birding times, but we saw a couple of bald eagles and a few falcons soaring in and around the rock faces.