Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Christmas Valley Labor Day 2012

Once again, Labor Day weekend was dedicated to Christmas Valley. It just seems like a three-day weekend is the perfect amount of time to spend down there, at least until Monday morning rolls around and I find myself wanting more time. This year, my Mom and brother met me at Green Mountain, camping in her new 5th wheel. I arrived LATE, after getting off work in Portland and driving out Friday night. I was, of course, in my trailer.
Saturday, after slowly getting our day started, we headed for Crack in the Ground, just a few miles south of camp. We explored the firs full section and a good ways into the second section but it was getting towards our early dinner time and we had Delilah, my mom's dog with us so we didn't go all the way to the end. From there we headed down to Silver Lake and the Cowboy Dinner Tree. Keegan and my mom were a little hesitant at the lack of menu choice but once we started eating, they got it. I think we all ended up having the steak. We had a 5pm reservation so after we ate, we poked around the gift shop then headed up to check out Hole in the Ground and the Fort Rock Homestead Village Museum which preserves and protects homestead-era structures by moving them from their original locations to the museum site on the edge of the town of Fort Rock. It was closed for the evening but we were able to at least see the buildings from the parking lot. Back to camp we headed for a campfire and a little stargazing before heading to bed.
Sunday morning we rolled north to Derrick Cave, a lava tube that fed much much of the lava that created Devil's Garden. We hiked in a ways but not to the end, as Delilah was waiting for us in the car. My mom brought a few glowsticks for us "kids" (her included) to play with in the dark. We stopped and explored the Blowouts just south of Derricks Cave for a bit. We drove back over to Fort Rock, had lunch at the parking area then spent an hour or so hiking around the rock itself, including all the way up onto the rim, awesome views up there. We headed down to the town of Christmas Valley for fuel and beverages. We spend a very long time in a junk store, finding plenty of goodies for all of us. As the shadows grew longer, we decided to explore the Lost Forest, which on paper, really sounded boring. Just a bunch of trees, who cares? It actually turned out to be a pretty cool area, once you realize how dry it is, the trees are pretty spectacular. While exploring the forest, we came across Sand Rock, a large rock formation that I've found virtually no information about. It's hard to even find many references to it online or on most maps. We climbed to the top and watched the sunset together before making our way down to the Jeep and back to camp.
Monday morning was time to drive home. Mom and Keegan broke off east toward hwy 395 up to Pendleton while I headed west. I first explored a road up to the top of Big Hole Butte before heading west amongst the returning Burning Man attendees. I stopped at the Ski Inn restaurant in Sisters for one of their delicious burgers, along with fries and a delicious shake. Coming across Santiam Pass, I decided to finally take the 46 road/hwy 224 from Detroit all the way to Estacada. It was very scenic but I was also trying to get home before dark so not many pictures were taken.


                                         

No comments:

Post a Comment