a weekend in john day oregon

Being a holiday weekend, Dan and I decided to take advantage of the extra day off and headed to Central-Eastern Oregon. We'd never been that far east in this state, and too our surprise, it looks completely different than any other part we've seen yet. That's the amazing thing about Oregon, in two hours you can make it from the rocky coast to the glaciers on Mt Hood. In another two hours, you're out of the mountains and into the high desert. Drive another two, and you're in rocky, multi-colored blue mountains. It's so beautiful!

On Saturday, we hit the road and drove along Route 26 thru the rainy Mt Hood Wilderness area, then the grasslands, and out to John Day. After driving miles on dirt roads, we found our campsite at Magone Lake, elev. 5000 ft, and met the cool campground hosts and their Jack Russel, Dodger.


After setting up camp, we hiked the 1.2 mile trail that went around the Magone Lake. We learned that beavers were responsible for damming up the creek and making the "lake". There are still beavers in the area, many of which are still chewing on the pine trees that surround the lake.


Sunday, we hiked the Black Canyon trail. That in itself was an all day adventure. After more dirt roads and honking at free range cattle, we made it to the trail head. 10 feet into the hike, was the first of the 18 stream crossings to come. We had a blast getting wet, making fun of all the cowpies, and saying hi to the black bear munching on some berries.

By 3pm, we made it thru our 8 mile hike and back to the car. Then we were off to check out the John Day Fossil Beds, Sheep Rock Unit. We were exhausted by the time we got there, but we made the effort to hike the .5 mile loop and took a couple of pictures.

On Monday, we packed up camp in the sub-freezing temperatures (yes, it was a whopping 32 degrees at 9am), and headed back home. We made a pit-stop at the Painted Hills National Monument and took a few more photos of the gorgeous scenery that you don't get to see from the highway.



All in all, it was a great weekend and we were able to enjoy our time with each other and fill our lungs with fresh air.

~Amy

the ape caves

With the near 100 degree temperatures this weekend, Dan and I decided to put on our hiking shoes and cool off while exploring some caves. In the Mount St. Helen's National Monument, there's a lava tube called the Ape Caves that is a nice cool 45 degrees year round. So we put on our jackets and head lamps and headed into the cave.

We had two options, a nice half mile easy walk, or a 1.75 difficult "walk". Of course, we had to do the difficult trail. It was a nice easy start, then bam, we ran into a huge pile of rocks that we had to scramble over. COOL! Thru the course of the hike, we hit probably a dozen or so patches of rock that we had to scramble over and squeeze through. By the end, we were thoroughly winded, dirty, and super geeked about what we just did. There were even a few parts that you had to use a rope to get up and over some ledges, however, being as skilled rock climbers as we are, bypassed the rope.

We can't wait to go back!!!