The morning at Soda Creek was COLD - we had a hard frost. Fortunately, we only had to wait a bit for the sun to come up and really start warming us up. We had a motel room waiting for us, so we weren't in a huge rush . . . but it was in Fields, Oregon - population 12. I didn't miss a decimal point. The town/village is tiny, but it does have a gas station ($8.25 a gallon of gas), a motel, and a restaurant. There is a Backcountry Discovery Route that just opened this year that kept the place somewhat busy. They are famous for their milkshakes (justified - generous serving size and delicious!) and hamburgers. We got there, had a milkshake, unpacked, showered, and then had dinner. I still couldn't finish the fries that came with my burger. Good stuff!
The next morning we rode south into Nevada and then back into Oregon through some incredibly remote stretches of road. In Oregon, we came across a hang gliding launch spot though there were not any hang gliders when we went through. We pushed on and got to the campground in Crater Lake National Park just as it was getting dark. There was no fire ban, which was a first in almost 2 full weeks of travel through Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and Nevada. Jason stayed to enjoy a fire while I boogied up to the rim to take some photos. The stars reflecting in the lake were incredible!
I got my photos and then hurried back down to enjoy the fire. We had two bundles, so there was plenty of time to relax and enjoy the moment. We headed up to the rim to see the sights in daylight and had to detour 30-45 minutes to get gas.
We rode through some gorgeous parts of Oregon on our way to the coast. Unfortunately there were two fires, one in Oregon and one in California, that contributed to the smoke/fog along the coast. It looked like fog but smelled like smoke - weird.
We dipped down into California to check out the redwoods (Jedediah Smith Redwoods State and National Park), but the smoke was somewhat atrocious.
Because the road we were going to take was closed for fire activity, we turned around and rode back up the way we came. We were improvising at this point. There were loads of campgrounds along the river we were riding along, but they were closed due to fires. We eventually stumbled upon a campground that had a site available and inexplicably also had no fire ban (we seriously rode through about 2 hours of apocalyptic smoke).
That was it. The next morning we rode a fantastic National Forest Road, which we basically had to ourselves, until we were a bit outside of Portland. We jumped on the highway, detoured to go see Mt. St. Helens, and got back home 3-4 pm. Plenty of time for laundry, showers, and a good meal (thanks to Catherine).
That wraps up this year's Mountain Man. Cheers,
Marc
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