Road Trip Adventures: Pine Mt.

Road Trip Adventures: Issue #2

Destination: Pine Mountain Observatory, Bend, Oregon

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[Author's Note: Things written in brackets like this are more notes to clarify what was originally written. I just added in more stuff as I was transferring this from the notebook it was written in to the computer.

Also, any time of day in italics with a star next to it is an estimate of what time it was when the event happened because I didn't write down what I did for awhile or I didn't have access to a clock at the time.]

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Friday, 10:58 am – So it begins!

11:00 am – Number of visions of disastrous trailer failure so far: 4.

11:01 am – Forgot directions to camp. Turned around.

11:06 am – So it begins. Again.

11:12 – Number of ways to kill dogs thought of: 42

11:24 – Miles traveled: 2.4. And we haven’t even made if halfway across town yet.

11:31 – Finally on the road. Bacon Cheesy Potato Burritos tried: 1

11:53 – Bacon Cheese Potato Burritos finished: 0

12:16 pm – Rest stop #1: Just outside Mill City. Reason it is the best rest stop ever: It has a Pringles dispensing machine.

12:40 pm – Back on the road. Bathroom breaks: 1. Water bottles finished: 1.

12:51 – Passed Detroit Dam/Lake. The water looks soooo refreshing right now.

1:40 – Fell asleep for awhile. Woke up to find that we lost all the good radio stations. Only jazz/oldies left. Just heard the song “Shout!”. Time for some new tunes. *turns in iPod*

1:43 – Now listening to Rainy Day by Coldplay. Much better.

1:47 – Pulled over to let the dogs (and Mom) pee. [Somewhere before this was when the dirt turned from grey gravel to red gravel.]

1:57 – I do so love having grandparents with an RV with a fridge. I got a muffin!

2:03 – Pit stop over. Music back on.

2:32 – LLAMAS!!!

2:41 – MORE LLAMAS!!!

2:45 – The trees got short and turned into shrubberies. Roger the Shrubber would be proud.

2:56 – Welcome to Bend! [Note: We finally got radio reception again.]

3:03 – Taking off shoes time now plz.

3:04 - !!! Convertible Lamborghini Saleen! *droooooooool….* Also: Dazzling Dahlias! Now playing at the Bloom Bloom Room! (From All Occasion Flowers & Gifts) And: a semi carrying a load of smooshed cars! Neat!

3:10 – Realization: Bend is big.

[Handwriting suddenly gets very messy] 3:37 – Just turned into Pine Mt. road. It’s a bumpy [and by bumpy I mean going down stairs in a car bumpy] dirt road. We have to go 6 miles uphill on this thing.

3:39 – just passed Mile Marker 1. This is gonna be a long trip. Average speed: 15-20 MPH.

3:42 – passed Mile Marker 2. *siiiiiiiigh*

3:45 – Radio Quote of the Day: “You can have it in any color as long as it’s black.” – Henry Ford, Ford Motors

3:48 – Mile Marker 3.

4:06 – Arrived at Deshutes Natl. Forest at Pine Mt. Campgrounds. First guy I see? Wearing a green lizard print Hawaiian shirt, black shoes, black socks.

*5:45 - Finished setting up pop-up tent trailer, camp, etc. Remarked on how weird the tree bark looks here.

*6:30 - Ate hangeburgers, hot dogs, chips. Times dogs barked at grandparents just for moving: too many times to count.

6:51 – Made campfire and roasted marshmallows. Mmmm…. Also made S’mores. Double Mmmm… Noticed just out quiet it is out here.

7:16 – Soaked up the quietness. Gonna miss it.

*8:27 - Walked up to Observatory for little intro speech by this self-proclaimed “professional amateur” astronomer. Showed us this really neat program called Stellarium. Go check it out! (It’s freeeeeee!)

*9:30 - [By this time it was almost pitch dark outside. It was so dark out here that you could see every single star up there, so many more than in the city or even the suburbs. Also it was really cold.] Went up to telescope with the giant group of people. Stood in line. Looked up at all the stars.

*9:42 - Finally got up to look through the GIANT telescope. Saw the double star at the head of the swan constellation, Cygnus. One was blue, the other was yellow-orange. Very pretty! Went out to see smaller telescopes that other people had set up. One was looking at the Andromeda galaxy, our closest neighbor. My mom looked into the eyepiece and said, “Hello, neighbor!”

*10:15 - Waited for the astronomer to change what we were looking at. Sat on benches that the astronomer said the following about: “We like to say the benches are angled back so people can leisurely look at the stars. Truth is, we built them that way so the change will fall out of your pockets.”

*10:47 - Got back up to look through the giant telescope again. It was pointed at the Great Globular Cluster of Hercules, M13. It’s made of billions of stars, and the light coming off was coming from only 200 of the stars in that cluster. To top it off, that light was created 380 years ago and is only just reaching us. Woah.

*10:58 - Got back to camp. Marveled at how many start we could see. The Milky Way is so clear and detailed because it’s so dark out here.

*10:58 - Bedtime.

Saturday, 7:57 am – Woke up waaay too early for vacationing. Back to sleep.

*8:30 - Woke up for real this time. Had breakfast of granola bars, hot chocolate (with water boiled in a pot over the campfire), and more roasted marshmallows. Talked for awhile, took pictures of chipmunks and the weird tree bark.

11:04 – Tried to catch a clicking grasshopper. Failed.

11:14 – Left camp for Tumalo Park. We’re gonna see if the dogs can/will swim! Later – Lava River Caves State Park. [We changed our minds and headed for the Lava Cast Forest instead.]

11:26 – Watched cows head in a very straight line down the road next to us. Feeding time maybe?

11:33 – Noticed that we’re surrounded by mountains—erm, very large hills. [You could see for miles and miles. It was incredible.]

11:40 – Finally made it to the highway back to Bend. The horrible bumpy road wasn’t as bad without the trailer. Average speed: 55 WHOO!

11:45 – China Hat Rd. Lol.

11:47 – Stopped to take pictures of the Prehistoric River.

12:09 pm – “Young Lady Smoke Tree is Hot!” [Flower nursery]

12:43 – Stopped at Burger King for lunch. Used the power of WiFi and my iTouch to get a map to Lava River Caves State Park. And for once, iPod’s “Find Location” actually found our location!

12:55 – This is so weird. We’re now waiting in line to get gas. I’ve never seen such long lines just to get gas.

12:57 – Screw this. We’re leaving.

1:20 – Now we’re heading up an even longer bumpy dirt road to see the Lava Cast Forest. Average speed: 28 mph.

1:29 – We figured out why these Natl. Forest roads aren’t paved—they’re property of the US government. Our government can’t even pave the Natl. Forest roads.

1:39 – Finally arrived at Lava Cast Forest. Very pretty and wooded up here.

2:26 – The brochure said it takes most people 45 minutes to walk the path. HA! We did it in 24 minutes. Not that we were racing or anything. The lava-cast holes were really neat. Just big, round holes in the ground where trees used to be. A huge lava flow knocked down a bunch of trees 6000 years ago, but some stayed standing. When they burned or rotted away, a hole was left. You can even tell the direction of the lava flow.

[Too tired after that to write anything until the following day]

Sunday, 11:51 am – Finished packing  and folding up the trailer. On our way to Lava River Caves. Goodbye chipmunks. Goodbye total darkness. Goodbye total quiet. Gonna miss ya.

1:08 – Arrived at Lava River Caves. I’m excited! Trying to find a parking spot with room for a camper.

[Went through the caves as far as our knees could allow, then had to go all the way back out the way we came. It got cold down there, which was refreshing after the dry hot days before. Slept the whole way home, except for maybe the last 45 minutes, during which I drained the battery on my iTouch playing Tap Tap Revenge: Coldplay Edition.]