Friday, May 29 – Sunday, May 31, 2020
I really needed some nature time so this weekend we headed to the Deschutes National Forest. We drove down on Friday, found a dispersed camping site off a dirt road, and set up camp. The snag you see in the second photo attracted lots of birds, which proved to be a big bonus:
We headed east over to the new Fryrear Trailhead at the Cline Buttes Recreation Area so Greg could check out some wildflowers:
There was a rough map with no mileages on it:
We started out on the trail, but without knowing how long any of the trails were we ended up just exploring off-trail in the vicinity of the trailhead:
We did indeed see some hardy desert wildflowers:
Showy townsendia:
Dwarf monkeyflower:
Sickle milkvetch:
We got a glimpse of the Three Sisters:
It was hot and cloudy which resulted in some muggy weather. We were wilting so we left Cline Buttes and headed to Jack Creek to cool off. It felt great, and it was a lovely spot.
We spent a pleasant evening at our campsite, enjoying the birds. Without any noisy neighbors we were able to enjoy the sounds of the forest:
Another bonus was all this dwarf lupine blooming around our site:
The next morning I made potato hash with smoked salmon:
Our first stop of the day was visiting the Head of Jack Creek, which we had been too tired to do the day before:
A short trail leads to the spot where springs gush forth from the ground, forming Jack Creek:
Because the creek is not fed by snowmelt, it never floods, and there are lush islands of vegetation all over the place:
Then we drove over to visit the Head of the Metolius:
This is like Jack Creek on steroids. The river flows from the ground at 50,000 gallons a minute. You’d expect some kind of great gushing forth, but it’s actually a quiet gentle appearance of water from beneath the earth:
You can see the very top of Mt. Jefferson from the viewing area:
Our next stop was going to be the Wizard Falls Fish Hatchery where we planned to start a hike along the West Metolius River Trail. But the bridge over to the hatchery was all blocked off and they didn’t even want people to walk over there:
So we took a quick picture of the river here and moved on:
We continued north on Road 14 and stopped at Bridge 99 (I have no idea how it got that name since there are nowhere close to that many bridges across the river):
We crossed the river and then made our way to Canyon Creek Campground so we could try our hiking from there up to the hatchery and back. We headed downstream from the campground, right along the Metolius River:
There are some very nice ponderosa pines here:
After half a mile we reached a really lovely spot where springs gush out of the hillside directly into the river:
Even though we had intended to hike another two miles up to the fish hatchery, the predicted storm was arriving. The sky was getting very dark, so we turned back. As we were hiking back we started hearing thunder at 1:45. By the time we reached the car at 2:00 it had started to rain. Back at the campsite we quickly retreated to the tent to wait out the storm. We ate cheese and snacks before taking a nap:
By 3pm the storm was over. We hadn’t actually done much hiking that day, so we took a stroll on the Lake Creek Trail to stretch our legs:
Back at camp I made a dinner of cheesy pasta with tempeh bacon and mushrooms
We normally drink cold beer or cider when camping, but due to the cool evening we decided to have a bottle of red wine instead:
The next morning was beautiful:
There were a lot of shotgun shells around our campsite so we picked those up before heading out:
We headed up to Trout Creek Butte. Got a nice view of the Three Sisters from the road:
This 86-foot-tall tower was built in 1933 but hasn’t been used in many years and is now unsafe.
Fire:
View of Black Crater:
Broken Top and South Sister:
South and North Sister (Middle Sister can’t be seen from this angle)
View on the drive down:
We stopped at the Sisters Cow Camp on our way back to the highway to use the bathroom. We stopped at a picnic table to eat a snack. We watched a truck with horse trailer pull in and three horses were led to the pens. This horse decided to take a dust bath, which was pretty funny:
Time to head home. Great to get out for the weekend!
