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Day
15. Whistlers Bend Park to Ochoco Divide Campground, Ochoco
National Forest |
Miles
today = 240 Total miles = 3645 |
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The
foggy view from the Bandon, Oregon docks. |
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The
North Umpqua River by the Whistlers Bend Park. A well known trout
stream, or so I've read. |
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| Okay,
we've known it for sometime now, well besides the refusal to spell
check, I am getting quite irritable. Something about the best-laid
plans I guess. Bend, Oregon will forever be in my memory as the abyss
of unmet expectations. I surely have my expectations way too high,
either that or my faith in consistency is based on an illusion of
a pattern that when followed long enough is bound to fail, I guess.
First, Safeway of Tillamook, then Bend from the Starbucks on the southern
end of town to the Target, egads, yes Target too, on the north end
of Bend. But anyway, we'll try to get back to the trip and see if my irritability will go by the wayside in Mitchell tomorrow morning. It’s not as if the whole of Orygun is out to get me. There were some bright spots so we'll start there. It got cold last night so I was a bit chilly and I see by the thermometer this evening that as soon as the sun went down it dropped 15 degrees. So the morning commute of the river/stream, which was so beautiful with the sun coming through the trees (for once I was up at the crack of dawn) that there were many photo opportunities, especially since it is a renown trout stream with sections for artificial lures only. But it was cold. So cold that when I finally go to a gas station at the way top which topped out at about 5,000 feet or so in elevation, I had to actually look at my hand to make sure it was around the brake lever. The elevation change coupled with the wind made the ride to Crater Lake, around it and back down out of the mountains, rather chilly. Crater Lake was a shining spot in my day for today was a free day. Whether for all national parks or just Crater Lake I didn't quite catch but it saved me the $10 entrance fee. Which is a big deal when I knew I was going to be in and out, and I was in around 2 hours. So I was happy. Now the road around the crater was something else. Apparently, the National Park System does not believe in guardrails. Plus, the signs stating “Falls will cause injury and even death” really makes one think before going over the speed limit. Okay, maybe every time rounding a curve and coming to a rail-less section, those drops off the sides were steep and no easy way back up. At least here most of the time you have a chance to grab a hold of a pine or boulder before pitching over the edge into thin air unlike on the Going-to-the-Sun road. Five miles wide that crater is and water depth of over 1,900 feet deep. It was one of the deepest blue lakes I've ever seen, and seeing it wasn't that easy with the hazy smoggy air. I looked for the road to the boat landing where they give boat tours but I never found one. That road, if there is one, must be quite a trip down. I never saw an area that wasn't steep down to the lake. After Crater it was on to Bend to get all cranky and miserable, like the smell of deer carcasses left to rot by the side of the road in my head, then on to whatever city was north of there for me to get lost and lose 45 minutes because of a detour and one-way streets—almost as bad as trying to get out of the mall that the Target was in. Yes the only Target that didn’t carry any of the foodstuffs I came to expect. Okay, okay, I'll try to stay on task but that mall was unbelievable to get out of. The lady with the stroller…I waited for her once to cross at the corner but not a second time. No way Jose. I made sure she and whatever she had in the stroller be a feared for their lives. She was going to be the object of my scorn, even if she didn’t know it. As it is has been with most of my days, the campground I was shooting for was further away than I thought it was. So I was thinking of boondocking, and seriously which is unlike me because I’m sure the anxiety of being told to move a long little doggie or hearing hunters gun shots in the woods would have kept me up all night, until I saw the sign for this campground. There are probably 30 sites, with maybe 4 or 5 being used. The biffys are spiffy. I had to inspect one because of its construction and cleanliness. I've got water right over there, the wastewater dump is over there and the only sounds are infrequent cars on the highway. The poor squirrel that ran to get under the table while I was eating was very upset with me and my scaring him out of his wits and up into the nearest tree. He, this little guy, barked loudly at me the whole time he sat there looking at me. After a few minutes of his sitting there he went up the tree, over to the next one to come down and jogged off as squirrels now can, continuing to bark as he went. Other highlights of the day include finding out that my power inverter actually works and does recharge my laptop. Thanks to the Starbucks of Bend, Oregon to shut off the power to their outlets AND charge for Internet for me to finally put my set-up to use. I never really had time to test it before I set out and then I didn't want to do it someplace |
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| It's a long way down in a hurry. View from Skell Head overlook. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Overlook
on the east side of Crater Lake. |
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click
on images to view larger |
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