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Mon: A long day in breathtaking landscape First thing first, coffee! We reached Thump in downtown at 6:45 am. Downtown Bend was absolutely dead. No car, not a person around. Just a lonely coffee shop with a dim light. Where we come from, coffee shop of this caliber would have a line out the door at this hour. Still, one guy beat us with his laptop.
Smith Rock was 30min from there. It was so empty that we were disoriented. We got on Misery Ridge trail by 8 am and were immediately rewarded with the endless postcard view of the cliff and river running at its foot. Misery Ridge trail went straight up on the short switchbacks. There were a few groups of climbers hiking steady and fast with loads of gear. The trail drops down just as fast on the other side. On the way down, a rock column popped up...the monkey face! You can't miss this Mount Rushmore of the monkeys! The trail dropped down to the other side, next to the river. Super serene. Back toward the start, more climbers were making their way in. Here, there are more climbers than hikers.
A 7-mile loop
put us ~11 am. We made a brief stop at our car to re-energize. It was a gorgeous day and getting hot without water. Before we call it, we scoped out to the north side too. It's not as scenic as the Southside. Betting that the view won't improve and it was past the planned time, we headed back to town.
We had lunch back in town. The idea was to take time getting to the Painted Hills so we get the softer afternoon sun. Picnicking by the river was perfect. We also stopped by the visitor center which was a hit! This guy delivered on the hot spring recommendation!
We got to the Painted Hills at 3:30 pm. There are 4 mini nature trails you can drive to. Each one is unique and has its own story. But the most impressive is the first one - the painted hills. We ended the visit with a 0.8-mile hike up on Carroll Rim Trail for a birds-eye view of the entire area. Past 7 pm, the colors were getting softer highlighting the amazing colors of the painted hills. What a view.
It was 9 pm by the time
we got to Redmond. It would be 9:30 in Bend and we'd be sliding into a brewery before they close at 10 pm. It was a wise decision to hit Wild Ride Brewery in Redmond. It is one of the breweries in Bend Ale Trail. We didn't know what to expect but it was happening on Monday night. The Very spacious building looked like it was a fire station at one point. Everything on the sampler was out of this world, putting yesterday's beer to shame. Bartenders were spot on. He even gave us his top 3 brews in Bend, yeah!
Tue: Scratching the Bend Ale Trail Following yesterday's long day, we will take it easy today. It was a perfect time to visit Sparrow Bakery. Of course, I had to have their ocean roll, a rare pastry with cardamom. Tumalo Falls is less than 30min drive. Perfect for our easy day. We got there shortly after 9 am. The drivable road will open up for the summer. In a mean time, enjoy the 4-mile hike. The waterfall reminded me of Minnehaha fall...on steroid. So. Much. Water!
After a quick bite at Market of Choice (quality stuff,
btw. Even better than Whole Foods), there was one agenda left for us in Bend: bar hop! Our strategy was to follow bartender's advice from last night. He remained credible throughout. His choices were: Freak cake at Crux, Sweet as at Goodlife, and Ching Ching at BBC. 5 out of 16 on the ale trail. Not bad for our short stay. Maybe we get to come back to complete it one day 😊. Market of Choice was a good repeat offender for the evening bite.
Wed: Oh my Crater Lake Early start at 6:30 am to get to the visitor center at its opening at 9 am. I'm usually antsy to get onto the trail but ehh why not, start with the intro video in the puny auditorium. Wow, crater lake wasn't made by a meteor? I had no idea...ha! Need for snowshoe was confirmed and we headed to the village shop to rent it. It opened at 10 am and we were off! We were geared up to be out there the whole day. It's just hard to predict how long snowshoeing will take since we don't do this often. One thing for sure: I'm done once
I get hungry. We had 24 oz water, plenty of bars, beanie, gloves, and layers of clothes...except! Our feet were wet 10min into it, facepalm. Newbie. Luckily, it was a very nice day and water in the shoes stayed as liquid. I guess we'll get to keep our toes, phew.
It had been a while since I last snowshoed and it took me some time to get used to but the hard work never changes. The park workers were starting to plow the road and that made me realize how high off the ground we were! At least 10ft above the plowed road. So much snow! We stayed as close to the lake view as possible even if that meant more climbing. The reward surely exceeded work. Stunning views of the lake with snow was simply breathtaking. Just couldn't get enough of it.
It took a few hours to move ~3 miles to the foot of Watchman Peak. From there, we just had to get around this hump to the other side to Watchman Overlook. That was my arbitrary goal. We're close...not! That's when things got rough. We were literally on a snow slant. Super scary. It felt
like if I lost the footing, I'd go tumbling down forever. We followed the narrow flat area created by the previous snowshoers. But sometimes it was wide enough to fit just one snowshoe. On another stretch, snow was so soft that even those snowshoe teeth were losing footing. Talk about death grip on the snow. The view at the Overlook, I must say, was worth it. You can't get that view elsewhere! We came 90-degrees on the island! So cool!
The return trip was rougher as my legs were like jelly already. Ugh, that slanted loose snow. But! We still climbed for the view. We both finished all 24 oz of water by the end. 8 miles. We made it back shortly after 4:30 pm; just in time for the snowshoe return. It was so nice to get out of wet socks. Apple and chips tasted gourmet. We made a brief stop by Rogue River Gorge. Again, so much water.
Across the street was our lodging for the night: Union creek's sole lodge resort. I can imagine this place being hard to book in summer. It's totally unwired, with gas station mini mart, and has a single-sourced cafe.
I had read about their pie before. A slice of very berry pie sounds good for dinner 😉.
Thu: The true spa Today was forecasted to be sure rain starting from the night. I couldn't sleep well and I was up by 4:30 am. That's more than 7hrs of sleep actually. Shortly after, the generator of the smoker at the lodge front started...kinda rude. Looks like it hasn't rained yet. Without wifi or tv for two days, we had no idea what the latest forecast was. We took a chance on Umpqua National Forest, at least to see what the hot spring is about. It took a ~1hr drive to the ranger station, following the good ol' Google map print out from the Bend tourist info guy. Ranger station was very spacious but there was just a lonely ranger on this gloomy weekday morning. She was super helpful because the hot spring was pretty tucked away.
Finally reached the parking lot after driving deep pothole filled gravel road for some time. Looks like it was going to be a short hike to the spring. The hike was somewhat gnarly with climbs, roots etc. It went up, down
then up again before the steps of pools opened up, overlooking the evergreen forest, wow! Super cool! There were around 6 pools and a few parties. I.e. we got to check out various pools! For a $5 day use fee, it definitely wasn't like that aromatherapy stuff. But It's a mud bath, literally. This is the real stuff. Legit. Since the spring flows from the higher pool to the lower ones, the water temperature changed from a pool to pool. It sprinkled here and there which felt great. The view was nothing but trees and river running in the valley way below. A pure luxury! We totally milked it for 1.5 hrs. Another 1-hr drive was nice and warm 😊. We went back to Becky's for another slice of pie...boysenberry this time.
Quick rinse and back on the road again to Eugene! The drive was scenic through the green mountain and along the river. During that drive, though, I started to feel drowsy. It quickly turned into a headache and body ache. Every friggin' joint was hurting!! By the time we reached Eugene, I was pretty much immobile. This brings me back to when I tried Bikram Yoga. I
Red Scar Knolls
Painted Hills Unitguess I’m not heat/humidity-rated 😞 Back to good ol’ Whole Foods ‘cuz my appetite was shot, grrr.
Fri: Getting through it in Eugene Finally, I feel functional. My leg is still not ready for jumping 😞 The rain forecast looked less promising later so we quickly headed to the bike trail by the Ducky stadium for V to do a shake-out run for tomorrow’s marathon. Literally, just when we were about to reach the trail, rain started to fall. It fell harder and harder, we went right back, straight to Coffee Plant.
At 10 am, we hit a few camera shops in an attempt to get our camera looked at. After yesterday’s hot spring, our camera decided to die 😞. So sad as it came with us to many cool places. We had no luck for a one-off Panasonic point-n-shoot.
At one point, the sky looked decent. Shake out run was on. While V was running, I went to get a bag of rice for the last shot at resurrecting the camera. We had lunch at Sundance Grocery. It’s a great hippy market! After the packet pick-up at 3 pm, we stopped by Market of Choice
Red Scar Knolls
Painted Hills Unit but the food wasn't as impressive as in Bend. We had no choice but to resort to the good ol' reliable Whole Foods.
Sat: A quick (fast) marathon before hitting the Oregon Coast The rain forecast was hovering 50%!a(MISSING)ll day. That’s as vague as it can get. Luckily it wasn’t raining yet, yay. Pacific Northwest Marathon takes a different route from the Eugene Marathon last week. It’s also very small and homey. It starts in a random neighborhood…go figure. After sending the runners off, I walked the short-cut to the 5-mile mark. Really, thank goodness it wasn’t raining. I had rain jacket on but it would have sucked for me too. V looked great ?.
From there, I thought I'd get some walking in since I had a few hours to kill before I catch V at 24-mile mark. About a mile into my stroll, I passed by an aid station. It was run by one lady and she was clearly up-to-here with the task. Trust me, I’ve done this before. It's impossible to line the cups, fill them with water, all the while runners are streaming through it. She gladly took my offer to help.
Painted Hills
View from Carroll Rim Trail I worked for a good 1.5hrs. This aid station was at (yet another) residential corner. The aid station lady knew the resident there and he offered us lawn chairs, aww. Mom n’ pop race at its best. It got sprinkly and cold but the show goes on. I parked at 24-mile point just in time to catch the dominant leader. V came by still looking strong just when the rain became strong. Woohoo! After giving him the final push, I hobbled to the finish line. PR (personal record) for V by over 2 min!! That is not easy! I know he was worried because his routine got screwed up by the mishap at last week’s marathon but I knew he’d do it. Great job V!
We had just enough time for V to rinse before the checkout time (note to self, stay in a hostel so we can shower after the check out time). Next stop: celebratory beer at Whole Foods. Boy do we love that Whole Foods place. Seriously, it was too early for a brewery to be open and Whole Foods bar had an amazing tap list from Eugene and Bend breweries.
A great start of
the day! We had even bigger agenda for the afternoon cuz we’re greedy like that :p. We will drive up coast to Lincoln City. It was misty and sprinkling here and there but the 2-hr drive from Eugene to the coast was scenic. This state is just so green!
First stop: Oregon Dunes. It’s a cool sight. The supposed walking path to the beach was blocked by a creek though. Pouting. Along the walk, we saw bear footprints. I mean it was big round foot with 5 sharp toes. Definitely not people or domestic animal. Kinda glad we didn’t go face-to-face but how?
Next stop: Thor's well. There is a short, paved path that goes straight down to Thor's well and Sprouting horn. You can't get too close to the well because the point is for the wave to crash it and disappear into the well. I’ve always wanted to see this for some reason. It took a little patience at Sprouting horn. Water had to hit it right for it to blow through the hole. But when it does, it’s an amazing sight.
The last stop of the day: Neskowin Ghost Forest. This looked so cool
in the picture. At the beach…doh! Beach creek blocking access again! Water was flowing deep and wide. There was no way to get to the other side. I can literally see the ghost forest in distance 😞 Well, not much we could do. It had been a long day. Dinner and pass out in Lincoln City.
Sun: Eating out way through Portland Before we head back inland to Portland, we gave Neskowin beach another attempt. Maybe the tide would be low? Meh, no luck.
First stop in Portland: Blue Star donuts! Man, the line was long already! A lot of things were out though…sad. Chase donuts with beer, right? We wanted to find a brewery to watch Warriors vs Spurs. Unfortunately, there was a soccer game right around the corner and if they had TV, that's what was on. After all, Warriors knocked the Portland team out of playoff. We finally found Rogue and watched the sad game 😞. There were a cool-looking breweries in Pearl district. If it wasn’t for the game, we’d totally have gone in.
Donuts, beer, ice cream, of course. Salt & Straw line was wrapped around the block at
3 pm! Looks like we’re hitting the right spots or it’s Mother’s day weekend. After the three-course junk food, my appetite shut down, haha, weak. V was still going strong and wanted Pok pok wings. I couldn’t have done a meal at that point if my life depended on it. Amazing. We capped the night off at Living Room theater. Love the low-key atmosphere.
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