Monday, May 26, 2055
Before heading home from our weekend in Bend we explored the Oregon Badlands Wilderness.
We parked at the Larry Chitwood Trailhead on the north side and headed down the trail:
Pile of rusty cans left from the Oregon Maneuver, a 1943 military training exercise:
Dwarf purple monkeyflower blooming amongst the detritus:
Greg lingered over flowers, and I hiked ahead. I reached a junction and turned left. More purple monkeyflower:
Anderson’s larkspur:
A huge old juniper:
Whitestem blazingstar:
I reached another junction and turned right to follow the Chitwood Loop. Another enormous juniper:
Foothill death camas:
Buckwheat:
At another junction the Chitwood Loop went right and I went left on the Sand Lily Trail. I did not see sand lilies, but I did see more monkeyflower:
Western wallflower:
Tidy tips:
I turned around, met back up with Greg, and we headed back to the car. We drove around to the Flatiron Trailhead on the south side. We headed up the Ancient Juniper Trail to see if we could spot some sand lilies. First we spotted a western fence lizard:
We saw some of the same flowers we saw earlier, including Anderson’s larkspur:
And monkeyflower:
I spotted my first sand lily, but it was past peak and fading:
We kept seeing sand lilies that were past peak, but then we came across an area of sand lilies that looked much better:
Mission accomplished! We continued on, meeting up with the Flatiron Trail and looping back to the car. At the trailhead we saw a Nevada side-blotched lizard. Very good camo!
Gaia stats: 5.7 miles (both hikes total)
