canyonwalker: Uh-oh, physics (Wile E. Coyote)
It's been a long week at work. Monday through Wednesday were go-go-go— or "busy-busy" as I put it in an earlier blog. Thursday wasn't much easier. I took an hour or so downtime after lunch but then worked solid through until around 6. Today was supposed to be my easy day, just a few hours of meetings and I'd arrange them so I could take part of the afternoon off to relax at the pool, enjoying the suddenly warm weather of the past few days. Haha, nope! I was busy much of the day. And by the time 3:15 rolled around, when my last meeting concluded, I was too tired to go enjoy myself. I didn't want to go out to the pool anymore; I actually felt more like laying down in bed for a nap. 😣

canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #10
Blue Lake, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 5:30pm

After hiking Downing Creek Falls earlier this afternoon we drove back up toward the Santiam Pass then south down the McKenzie River canyon. We passed a few signs for waterfalls along the way and sped past them at 60mph, confident they weren't interesting. (Ironic foreshadowing: they were totally interesting. We'd have to come back for them!) We turned west, heading back uphill along Old McKenzie, and reached the trailhead for Proxy Falls.

A rough, dry trail to Proxy Falls (Jul 2025)

The Proxy Falls trail is a loop with spurs off to two waterfalls, Lower and Upper Proxy Falls. We quickly found that our AllTrails.com map was out to lunch. It showed the first part of the trail as being downhill. You can see in the pic above that it's decided uphill. We huffed and puffed up a ridge of volcanic rubble.

Just as we were running out of steam the trail leveled off. Soon enough we reached the spur for the first falls.

Lower Proxy Falls is nice but mostly shrouded from the trail... (Jul 2025)

The spur trail led to a partial view of Lower Proxy Falls. Much of the Falls, especially its base, was shrouded by dense trees down in the canyon. The trail seemed to peter out here. Keyword: seemed.

We paced back and forth a bit, peering down the little ridge we were on to see if there'd been a washout or slide that obscured the trail. Sure enough, there had been. We could see remnants of a trail at the bottom of the hill. We picked our way carefully down the hillside, then balanced on and climbed over the trunks of huge fallen trees across the bottom of the canyon until we reached the foot of Lower Proxy Falls.

Some clambering got us to the base of Lower Proxy Falls (Jul 2025)

To really get the best view of the falls we had to walk out into the middle of the creek. At first I hesitated as I was wearing my hiking sandals instead of my boots. Boots would let me step through a few inches of water without getting my socks wet. But I deemed that the weather was warm enough to deal with wet feet, plus what's beauty without a little discomfort? 😅 We walked into the creek and got our feet wet.

Some clambering got us to the base of Lower Proxy Falls (Jul 2025)

Once we were satisfied drinking in the view of the falls and soaking our feet in chilly water we scrambled across the big logs (much bigger than those you see in the photos above!) to the bottom of the hill opposite the falls. We picked a different route to the top, looking to save ourselves a few steps. I took a small spill on the way up. Again, what's beauty without a bit of discomfort. 🤣

At the top of the hill we met a pair of hikers looking for the falls. We told them about our cross-country, wet-foot expedition, and they basically said, "Yeah, no." In fact I think those were their exact words: "Yeah, no." 🤣

Fine by me if they choose to stay on the bunny trail. Me? In beauty I walk.

Keep reading: These were Lower Proxy Falls; next we visit Upper Proxy Falls!


canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #9
Detroit, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 4pm

After an enjoyable hike at Tumalo Falls near Bend this morning we drove back near town to get some lunch. By then it was already noon. We picked a frou-frou burger restaurant on the west side of town because it meant not having to drive all the way into town. Plus, their menu had a few not-so-frou-frou options so we felt we'd be covered. It was decent; maybe decent-plus.

After lunch we hit the road again and drove over Cascade crest to the west and halfway down toward the Willamette Valley. There, in the Western Cascades, was our next hiking destination, Downing Creek Falls. I'll start you with a video of the falls while I explain a bit more about the hike.



Finding this hike was hard. It was hard even with a good trail description and GPS maps on our phones. That's because the trail is up an unmarked dirt road. At a fork in the road where the trail notes suggested we park and start hiking, we pushed further in our car, confident of its 4x4 capabilities and my ability to use them. Our boldness in that respect was rewarded; we cut about half the length off the hike just by driving up the two-track until we reached a natural blockade where the two-track turned to an overgrown single track. We pulled on our packs and hiked the rest of the way.

Downing Falls, Oregon (Jul 2025)

The foot trail was faint and overgrown in many places. It took some wilderness skill on our part to keep heading in the correct direction. Before we reached the main falls (pictured) we saw some small cascades and a weeping wall. From there we could hear the main even slightly further up the canyon so we pressed on.

Downing Falls, Oregon (Jul 2025)

Once we reached the falls we lingered for a while at the back of the canyon, climbing around on the slick, steep ground to view the falls from different angles.

Downing Falls, Oregon (Jul 2025)

This whole time we had the falls entirely to ourselves. That's one of the pluses of sticking through to find a remote, poorly signed falls. Though as beautiful as these falls are I'm surprised the Forest Service hasn't marked or maintained the trail.

Update: on the drive back out to the road we did pass another hiker coming in. Our two vehicles could barely pass on the two-track! He deftly wedged his crossover as close to the side as he could, while I plowed our SUV about a foot into the undergrowth on the right. We passed with just inches to spare.

canyonwalker: Driving on the beach at Oceano Dunes (4x4)
Last week our Nissan Xterra passed 130,000 miles. It was on the last of several days we spent in Oregon, just after we finished hiking at Smith Rock State Park.

Reaching 130,000 miles on a trip in Oregon (Jul 2025)

Unlike some other times we've passed a big milestone with a car I didn't pull over to take pictures. On the narrow country lane we were driving at the time there wasn't room. Thus I settled for taking a few quick pictures from behind the wheel.

Reaching 130,000 miles on a trip in Oregon (Jul 2025)

Speaking of other milestones, I don't think I've posted one of these "Milestone xxx,xxx" blog entries since we hit the 100,000 mile mark with this car. And that was nearly five years ago.

Part of the reason it's been five years between posting about milestones is that it took five years to add these 30,000 miles. We don't drive this car as much as we used to. I mean, not that this car really ever saw us packing the miles on, though there was a period of about a year when I used it for a 75 mile/day commute. That packed on the miles. But 30k in the past 5 years is an average of just 6,000 miles/year. That's less half the US average of 12-15k/year.

Why is our mileage so low? Well, it's not from avoiding long car trips. 😅 We drove 1,762 miles in 6 days on this Oregon trip. In fact big trips like this, plus medium trips where we drive 400-500 miles in a couple of days, like the Spring trip we did to the Sierra foothills in March, account for at least half of the mileage overall nowadays. Short trips around town most days of the week are the other half. What's not part of the mileage is commuting to work. That's because I've worked remotely for several years.

This car, a 2011 model, is now nearly 14 years old. We occasionally wish it had some more modern features, like Apple CarPlay, though we bought an inexpensive BlueTooth adapter for it that makes it only slightly fussy to play our tunes from our phones. We're in no rush to have a car payment again. We can imagine keeping this car for a few more years.... or until it requires a costly repair. Yes, sadly, this Nissan has needed a few $1,000+ repairs plus one $2k repair several years ago that actually cost more like $4k when including the towing costs (the car died in a remote small town) and travel costs (we were 1,000 miles from home). Thankfully our most recent spot of car trouble only cost us $150.

canyonwalker: wiseguy (Default)
I'm glad that we got back from our trip to Oregon a bit after 5pm on Sunday. Having a few hours to unpack and wind down on Sunday evening has made it easier to hit the ground running at work this week. And running is what I've been doing. I mean, not literally running; I have a desk job! But running from one meeting to the next. My calendar has been booked solid with meetings and assorted work tasks the first three days this week.

It's customary at each meeting as the first few of us join to ask one another, "How are things going?" We Americans know this is a generic greeting, a perfunctory statement of positive intent. The expected answer is an equally perfunctory, "Fine, thanks, and you?" It is absolutely not an actual question to which an actual, detail answer is expected. This cultural norm is mildly annoying  to people from other English-speaking cultures and absolutely bewildering to people from outside the Anglosphere.

Well, I've started to surprise my fellow Americans by answering "How are you doing?" and "How are things going?" with "Busy, busy!" It's a simple and true statement. And it's amusing how many people are gobsmacked by my not-"fine" response.

canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #8
Bend, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 11:30am

I posted two blogs already about hiking Tumalo Falls and all I've shared is... Tumalo Falls (see part 1, part 2). Well, okay, not just the falls but also a bit about the art and science of photography. But, hey, there's still hiking to be done here. In beauty I walk, and all of that.

Double Falls on Tumalo Creek near Bend (Jul 2025)

The trail continues past Tumalo Falls up a pretty stream canyon. Maybe a mile or so in it reaches Double Falls. These aren't as awe-inspiring as Tumalo Falls but definitely worth the extra hike.

Double Falls on Tumalo Creek near Bend (Jul 2025)

I'm sharing here two pictures, one I took with each of the cameras I'm carrying. I won't explain this time what the differences are.... I leave that to you for homework. It'll be easy if you've actually read my past two blogs and not just looked at the pictures. (Extra credit for identifying where that quip comes from, BTW. 🤣)

At 2 miles this isn't a huge hike. It's certainly not our plan for the day. It's actually just our plan for before lunch. We'll hike back down and drive back into town for some eats, then drive up over the crest of the Cascades for more hikes this afternoon.


canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #7½
Bend, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 11am

Hiking Tumalo Falls near Bend, Oregon is our first new hike of this trip. Yesterday we visited Paulina Falls, which was beautiful, but we'd been there once before, six years ago. In my blog earlier today I slow-walked the start of our Tumalo Falls hike, writing extensively about some of the tech of photography behind photographing waterfalls. Well, there's more. 😂

Tumalo Falls, Deschutes National Forest, Oregon (Jul 2025)

One of the differences I noted between modern iPhone cameras and traditionally designed (but still modern) dedicated cameras is that iPhones do exposure stacking. They automatically capture multiple frames of an image in rapid succession and then blend those frames together seamlessly to produce a single image that's presented to the user. It seems like you clicked the shutter button once and got one simple picture, but there's a lot of fancy computation and image processing happening inside the device. And partly it's doing that because there's so much computational power on board. The A18 processor in my iPhone, which is already a year-old model, is approximately 100,000 times more powerful than the computers that sent the Apollo 11 mission to the moon. And here I'm just asking it to take a better waterfall picture. 😅

So, what's better about it? Take a look at the rock wall to the right of the falls. In the photos I shared earlier (previous blog) it's hard to make out the details. Here, in this photo, my iPhone recognized that the shadowy area was a big part of the picture and worked to illuminate it better.

Compare that to a traditional dedicated camera, which really does capture just one picture and deliver it to you when you press the trigger:

Tumalo Falls, Deschutes National Forest, Oregon (Jul 2025)

...Okay, well, that rock wall to the right isn't too bad, is it. It's totally not all dark shadows. But that's because I worked hard in Photoshop to fix it. Even with my deft use of layers and masking and the "Shadows and Highlights" tool, there are still artifacts I could not avoid. Artifacts are those tell-tale fingerprints that indicate the image has been 'shopped, like the Photoshopped portrait of Princess Kate and her kids that sent people into a tizzy last year. And despite those artifacts that a trained eye easily spots, the shadow recovery I did in Photoshop with Tumalo Falls still doesn't look as good as the straight-out-of-the-camera (SOOC) photo from my iPhone 16 Pro.

Are other parts of my dedicated camera + Photoshop pic better? Absolutely. The richer colors in the second photo are SOOC, which is a huge reason I continue to lug around my dedicated camera and lens set even while my comparatively svelte iPhone is always in my pocket. Plus, as I explain in my previous blog, the motion blur on the water is an effect I can create SOOC with my dedicated camera that there isn't yet a practical way to do with an iPhone. Maybe soon, though; maybe soon....

canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #7
Bend, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 10:30am

We got a bit of a late start leaving our hotel room in Bend today. As a result we put off a hike in the desert-y terrain west of here because we'd want to start early to beat the heat until later in the week. Instead we came here, to the Oregon Cascades where there's shade on most trails, and hoped we weren't starting too late for the popular Tumalo Falls trail. We weren't; we arrived in good time. And it would be the first of at least six (depending on how you count them) waterfalls we'd see today.

Fair warning: In this blog I'm going to talk tech(nique) about photography. If that makes your eyes glaze over, you're more than welcome to employ the Playboy magazine approach of just looking at the pictures and not reading the article. 🤣

Tumalo Falls, Deschutes National Forest (Jul 2025)

If waterfalls were scored on a scale of views divided by distance or effort to get to them, Tumalo Falls would score very highly. The first viewpoint, where I make the photo above, is just steps from the trailhead. There's also an upper viewpoint that you can see above the falls to the left in the pic above. I'll get back to that in a moment.

On this trip I carried two cameras, as I often do— though less now than before. The two cameras are 1) my cell phone's built-in camera, which I virtually always have with me, and 2) my Fujifilm interchangeable lens camera that I opt to carry with me when I think the views are going to be really great... or require one of the things that camera, and the special lenses I own, are really good for. I'm selective about bringing the latter camera because it's comparatively heavy and bulky.

So, what's this heavy, bulky (comparatively) camera really good for? Let's start with the same basic picture:

Tumalo Falls, Deschutes National Forest (Jul 2025)

One thing you can see straight away by comparing these first two photos is that, in good light, the Fuji captures way richer colors than my iPhone. "Oh, but can't you punch up the colors in Photoshop?" you might ask. I already did! The first picture is the result after fiddling a bit with saturation and contrast. The Fuji kicks the iPhone's iAss when there's good light.

BTW, why do I specify "good light"? Take look at the deep shadow to the right of the falls. The iPhone pulls out more detail in the shadow. Again, yes, I can try to fix that in Photoshop, and again, yes I've already done that in the Fuji's picture. The difference is that modern iPhone are actually doing exposure stacking, automatically combining multiple images capture immediate after each other at different exposure values to show more detail in areas of deep shadow. Doing this with a conventional camera involves a technique called HDR— high dynamic range— that requires some manual steps in addition to special software. The iPhone just does it automatically and gives you the result without you even having to think about it.

Okay, so rich colors in good light are nice, but what else can the heavy, bulky camera do? Well, I like to bring it whenever I know I'll be seeing waterfalls, because it can capture motion-blurred water.

Tumalo Falls, Deschutes National Forest (Jul 2025)

Here's a photo from the same vantage point again but with the camera set to make an exposure lasting 0.25 sec. Relative to that speed the water is moving very fast, so it blurs into an appearance like silk sheets, while the trees' leaves move only slightly and the rocks move not at all.

Achieving this blur effect requires a few pieces of equipment and a degree of control over the camera. The key piece of equipment is a neutral density (ND) filter, a lens attachment that blocks out most of the light. This allows the camera to be set with a very slow shutter speed and not capture an image that's all washed-out white from so much light hitting the sensor. Remember, photography is the art and science of captured light. Capture too little, the picture's all black. Capture too much, the picture's all white. I'm using an ND filter that blocks 98.5% of the light. (Why 98.5%? That's an approximation. It's actually passing through 1/64, or 1/26, of the light. This is called a 6 stop ND filter. Every "stop" is a factor of 1/2.)

While this extra gear is fun to use effectively it's also a minor nuisance to use. Or, more specifically, switching in and out of the gear is a nuisance. The filters screw on and off the front of my lenses, and I have a little pouch to keep them in when they're not screwed on a lens. Going back and forth between "filter is screwed on" and "filter is off, and stowed" is time consuming. And on the trail it's also a bit dangerous. What if I drop a filter? The big ones aren't cheap. And when they get dirty I have to clean them— which while hiking is also a nuisance.

Thus I decided after doing the screw-it-on/screw-it-off thing at the viewpoint near the trailhead I would just leave the ND filters on the lenses on my Fujifilm camera. I'd use my iPhone for standard snaps and my Fuji for the specialized blur shots. BTW, that's how pro photographers roll. When you see them juggling multiple cameras at an event, it's because the camera are set up to do different things really well, and it's easier to swap cameras between shots than to reconfigure the gear. So, for the rest of the hike I rolled like a pro. 😅


canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #3
La Pine, OR - Tue, 1 Jul 2025, 4:30pm

Tuesday afternoon on our trip I finished work early— yes, Tuesday was a work day for me— and we headed out for an afternoon hike. We picked Paulina Falls in the Newberry National Volcanic Monument. It was basically on our way from Klamath Falls to Bend for the night.

Paulina Falls upper viewpoint (Jul 2025)

Paulina Falls is a short hike from the trailhead. And by short I mean the upper viewpoint shown in the pic above is about 150 meters from the parking lot. It's a walk in the park. We had the place virtually to ourselves, though, because a) today's a weekday and b) the weather is turning crummy. It's been kind of overcast all day, but on our drive up to the higher elevations here (we're at about 6,300' vs. down in the valley at 4,200') it's started to sprinkle rain. The rain's not enough to bother us. We simply pulled on our light rain jackets for the hike.

Speaking of hike, yes, there is more than just the 150 meter stroll to the upper viewpoint. There's also the lower viewpoint.

Paulina Falls lower viewpoint (Jul 2025)

The lower viewpoint is an easy walk down a switchback path along the side of the canyon. It's a bit a huff-and-puff trek back up, though, especially for us, not acclimated to the altitude of over a mile.

These falls are fed by water from Paulina Lake. Unlike some double falls we've seen where the two falls are actually different creek that happen to meet as they fall over the same mountain, this is actually one creek. It just splits around some rocks upstream and falls over this cliff in two places. You can read more about the geology of the area in my blog from our last visit here... six years ago.

Paulina Falls unofficial middle viewpoint (Jul 2025)

Something I did this time that's a bit different from six years ago was venturing out on an unofficial middle viewpoint. You see, there are well designated spots for the upper and lower viewpoint. But IMO the best vantage for seeing the falls is from one of the switchbacks on the canyon trail down to the lower viewpoint. And it's not just at the switchback but maybe 30' around the canyon wall from it, over a brush pile designed to keep people out and then hopping and climbing along some precarious perches on the canyon wall. Oh, you daredevil, me.

canyonwalker: Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. Travel! (planes trains and automobiles)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #24
Back home - Sun, 6 Jul 2025, 6pm

We're back home from our trip to the Oregon Cascades and high desert. We got back home a bit after 5pm today, was a bit over 6 days after we left home Monday afternoon. The trip today was all driving, no adventuring, as we decided this morning we just wanted to get home. Today's drive was 334 miles, bringing the total distance for the trip to 1,762 miles. That's a lot to cover in 6 days— nearly 300 miles per day— especially with all the hiking we did in addition to the driving.

We're already unpacked from the trip. We make a point nowadays of unloading everything from the car and putting it away as soon as we get home. Years ago we'd sometimes play the "Ugh, we're so tired" card and leave things in the car, intending to unpack the next day. The thing is, there's usually no more convenient time to do it. The next day after a trip is usually a work day, which means there are plenty more reasons to put off unpacking. I think the record was stuff got left in the car for a week one time. 🤣

Speaking of tomorrow being a work day, it is. For me, at least. That was a big part of why I favored coming straight home today. At 6pm now it's not exactly "early", but I've got things unpacked, I'm stretching out to relax, and I can take it easy the rest of this evening. All this will make it somewhat easier to start a full work week tomorrow morning.
Edit to add: One thing that's not done from this trip is the blogging. I figure I've got about 10 blogs stuck in the backlog. We'll see if I can clear them out this week.

canyonwalker: Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. Travel! (planes trains and automobiles)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #23
Yreka, CA - Sun, 6 Jul 2025, 9am

Sometimes you pick a hotel for the night and it turns out to be a bad one. That's what happened to us last night— or, rather, about a week ago when we picked the Comfort Inn in Yreka, California, that we checked into last night.

"Why Yreka?" you might ask. (That's an alliteration, BTW, as Yreka is pronounced WHY-reek-ah.) And also, "Where's Yreka?" 😅


 
We drove to Yreka yesterday after finishing up an amazing hike at Misery Ridge in Smith Rock State Park in Oregon. Part of the idea for stopping at this small town in far northern California was it's a halfway home stop to finish up our July 4th trip to Bend, Oregon. It's kind of like our Friday Night Halfway strategy for getting a jump start on trips, but in reverse. The other part of the idea was that Yreka wouldn't just be a stopover point halfway but could be a good jumping-off point for a hike in, say, the Shasta-Trinity mountains today.

A pall was cast over the whole plan when we checked in to the hotel, a Comfort Inn, last night and found it below our expectations. One little thing that we spotted as we parked is that the pool area doesn't include a hot tub. It would been nice to relax our sore muscles after the Misery Ridge hike. Oh, and speaking of "as we parked"... the hotel shares a parking lot with a Taco Bell. That kind of became a signifier for everything else. 🤣

The main unwelcome surprise at the hotel was that it has no elevator. That was unexpected because it's a hotel with interior corridors. It's normal for motor-lodge style hotels with rooms that open from exterior breezeways not to have elevators. However this Comfort Inn has interior corridors. I haven't seen an interior-corridor hotel that lacks elevators since... since I was a kid. And it was an old hotel built in the 1930s. This hotel was built in the 21st century. Plus, Comfort Inn, as a brand, is positioned in the market a level where things like "Has an elevator" are table stakes. Here I was worried about whether Days Inn would measure up on this trip, and it's the higher positioned Comfort Inn that falls short. The lack of an elevator would be only a minor annoyance other trips except Hawk was struggling with mobility yesterday evening. And the hotel had no ground floor rooms left available. (Probably everyone who checked in before us demanded them upon learning there's no elevator.)

Then there's the view from our window....

Check out this view from our hotel window... a storage shed AND a freeway on-ramp! (Jul 2025)

I'm not sure if this is better or worse than a view of the Taco Bell. 😅 When I open the window I can still hear them taking orders at the drive-thru. 🤣

Other things came up short with the Comfort Inn and Yreka, too, but I don't want to dwell further on them. One thing that went right was the bed was comfortable— better than we've slept in the past several days. And, especially after a good sleep, today's a new day.

Today's a new day, but we're tired. I swatted my snooze button until 8 this morning. While Hawk was still sleeping in I began researching places we could hike today and I... I just can't. I don't feel like hiking today.

I broke the bad news to Hawk a few minutes ago when she got up. She didn't take it badly at all. She's worn out, too, and is game just to go home.

If we pack and leave now we could be home just after 3pm... assuming we keep time spent on stops for lunch and gas to a minimum and don't hit traffic. But it's Sunday on a holiday weekend so we probably will hit traffic. And that's another reason to start the drive home early. Traffic slowdowns headed back into the SF Bay Area will only get worse late in the afternoon and into the evening.


canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #22
Misery Ridge, OR - Sat, 5 Jul 2025, 3pm

We're hiking the Misery Ridge trail. You know we had to take pictures like this.

Hiking the Misery Ridge trail at Smith Rock State Park (Jul 2025)

But really we weren't miserable. At least not yet, while we were at the top of the ridge. 🤣 There were so many beautiful sights up there!

I already wrote about the hike around the river and the climb to Monkey Face (previous blog entry). Here's another view of Monkey Face:

Views from atop Misery Ridge at Smith Rock State Park (Jul 2025)

This one's with anonymous hiker standing where I posed for my selfie in the previous blog.

That snow capped peak in the distance is Mt. Jefferson, BTW. It's one of seven volcanic peaks in the Oregon Cascades you can see from up here, including all three of the Three Sisters.

Views from atop Misery Ridge at Smith Rock State Park (Jul 2025)

There are other views from atop Misery Ridge beside the Monkey Face. This is that forbiddingly steep dark ridge that looms over the river. From here it looks like I could hike down to it and skip along its top.

But I didn't. Because, while the hike up here wasn't exactly miserable it also wasn't... a walk in the park. 🤣 It was hard. And I wanted to rest.

Resting atop Misery Ridge... this tree serves as my dressing stand (Jul 2025)

Hawk sat down on a bench with a view over Monkey Face while I hiked down to it. When I came back I didn't want to sit, exactly. I was concerned if I sat I might not want to stand back up... and hike all the way down the mountain. So I stood. In the shade. And used this tree as my dressing stand to take the weight off my pack off my back while I stretched.

Soon enough it was time to start down. This being the Misery Ridge loop route we selected, we didn't have to double back the way we came. There was still more trail ahead of us.

Descending Misery Ridge at Smith Rock State Park (Jul 2025)

That trail ahead of us was the steep part of the trail. The part that does countless switchbacks up the front face of Smith Rock. From the top it's no less steep... though it is at least down.

Going down still doesn't make it "a walk in the park". Going down a steep trail is a toe-jamming, knee-jarring, try-not-to-slip affair. Hawk and I did it mostly in silence.

Descending Misery Ridge at Smith Rock State Park (Jul 2025)

The last bit down the steep switchbacks reminds of playing Donkey Kong. This is what it would have looked like from the ape's point of view. Maybe that's why the rock at the top looks like a monkey face!

When we crossed the bridge at the bottom of the canyon I rested up at that round oasis for a bit. This time I did sit... because I needed to regain strength for the 200' climb up and out of the canyon. While sitting there I chatted with some climbers about the day's beautiful weather. "It's hot out here, is it 90°?" one asked the other. "No, it's only 75," the second answered. I chimed in that 75 was correct, adding that it certainly feels like 90 because of the sun exposure. "And I'm so glad we hiked today when it's not actually 90, like it was a few days ago," I quipped. Yeah, it would've been a lot tougher on us if we'd done this hike on Tuesday like we'd originally planned.

Hawk caught up to me at the oasis. I didn't realized how far she'd fallen behind. She was in bad shape from the steep descent. I took her pack for the climb out. I think for her this was the Misery Ridge part of the trek. For me it was... well, I chose not to form an opinion of it. It was just the last thing we had to do to finish an otherwise amazing hike. In beauty I walk... even if I'm hobbling at the end 

I'm jotting down these notes as we're stopped just outside the park. There's an ice cream store here! Middle of nowhere, and someone has the bright idea to build an ice cream shop right next to desert-y park where everyone comes out hot and tired and hungry from hiking. Brilliant!

canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #21
Misery Ridge, OR - Sat, 5 Jul 2025, 1pm

Today we finally did our "big hike" near Bend. It's the one we put off for two days already, and did lighter-duty hiking instead, because one or both of us felt tired, or the weather sucked. It's a loop trail at Smith Rock State Park 25 miles north of Bend, and it crosses over the aptly named Misery Ridge.

Smith Rock State Park, Oregon (July 2025)

Just to look at Smith Rock is to think, "Oh, yeah, I totally want to hike that!" Then you see the switchback trail (far right) coming down around the side of the big ridge and realized that it's going to be a serious undertaking. And that's only part of the climb. Oh, and you're starting on a ridge across the river, descending 200' just to start— which means after you climb up and over the ridge and come back down, you get the added misery of having to climb another ridge just to get out. Fun, fun, fun!

Walking along the river at Smith Rock State Park (Jul 2025)

A park ranger we talked to at the visitors center recommended we hike the loop "backwards" from how most people do it and the map on AllTrails.com shows. Instead of climbing those steep switchbacks first, with zero shade, she suggested we hike the loop around the base of the rocks along the river and take the ascent up the back side. The backside would offer a more gradual ascent, she said.

The river walk was beautiful, and easy— though the 75° weather under high desert sun felt like 90°. Soon enough it was time to climb.

Ascending switchbacks toward Monkey Face at Smith Rock State Park (Jul 2025)

The switchbacks on the back side of the ridge ascend beneath an interesting rock formation called Monkey Face. You can kind of see it from this angle.... The monkey's face is atop that spire, facing left.

The Monkey Face at Smith Rock State Park (Jul 2025)

Once atop Misery Ridge I took a short spur down to the rocks immediately across from Monkey Face. The spire bears both more and less resemblance to its namesake from this angle.

Whew! The hard part is done, right? Oh, wait, there's that toe-jamming descent down the front side of the ridge, then the climb out from the river. Stay tuned for more!

Update: More of Misery Ridge in part 2!

canyonwalker: Hangin' in a hammock (life's a beach)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #20
Bend, OR - Fri, 4 Jul 2025, 10:45pm

We spent a lot of the day taking it easy in Bend today. Really too much of the day. I get it that sometimes the weather doesn't cooperate with outdoors adventure plans, or that we need to take an easy day when we're traveling, or both. The take-an-easy-day thing is a reality we've faced more frequently as we get older. I accept that. But as I gazed at the bright blue sky out the window of our hotel room— a blue sky that the weather forecast continued to insist did not exist, had not existing at all today, and would not exist until tomorrow— I grew frustrated that what started as "Sure, let's take it easy" had turned into frittering. Inertia. Languor.

Hawk was still feeling out of sorts. She made it clear that she was willing to hike but not in a headspace to plan things or make decisions. She knows I know what she likes and is willing and able to do, so she trusted me to do the planning. I reviewed the lists of hikes we'd collected for this trip, checking them against maps for what there was still time in the day to do. As the hour wound toward 3pm we'd already frittered away more than half the day. But surely there was something to do. Indeed, I came up with not one but two possible hiking itineraries. One was desert-y and the other waterfall-y. Knowing Hawk, I figured the one with the waterfalls would be better. And I felt more like seeing waterfalls, too.


 
We drove northeast from Bend over the crest of the Cascade Mountains to Willamette National Forest. First we visited Gooch Falls, then drove south to another trailhead for the two-fer of Sahalie Falls and Koosah Falls. Actually the latter was more like a three-fer or even four-fer, as the McKenzie River flowing over these big falls also cascaded over a few smaller falls in between them.

As with the past few days, I'm holding up on detailed blogs with photos to keep more on top of the chronology of the trip. I'll add links here when I'm ready to post those blogs.

You may notice that the driving route for this trip bears a lot of resemblance to our trip of two days ago, when we hiked Downing Creek Falls and Proxy Falls. Indeed we drove right past the turnoff for Downing Creek Falls on our way to Gooch Falls today, and the drive from there to Sahalie and Koosah overlapped part of our drive to Proxy Falls.

"Why didn't we combine these trips together better?" you might wonder. I wondered that, too. And I was frustrated about it. The simple answer is that we didn't plan well enough. We didn't adequately research the location of all the hikes on our various lists. On the other hand, even if we did research them better, there are the issues of time and energy. There aren't enough of either to do all the proximally located hikes in one day. So we made another trip back over the summit and hiked them today.

And you know what? These hikes were awesome. All my frustrations about doing the same drive again two days later melted away, completely disappeared, as I saw the surprisingly big Gooch Falls. And Sahalie and Koosah and all the little falls in between them made today an excellent day— even though we didn't leave the hotel until just after 3pm.

Of course, the morning wasn't wasted. Soaking in the hot tub was nice. And late this evening I went back out to the hot tub for another soak. Oh, and during this soak, at 10pm, there were fireworks— because it's July 4th! I relaxed in the hot water with hotel neighbors I'd just met, watching the fireworks show for 30 minutes.

canyonwalker: Hangin' in a hammock (life's a beach)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #16
Bend, OR - Fri, 4 Jul 2025, 2:30pm

When we plan a trip around activities, which is most of our trips, we think in terms of maximizing the value of our time away from home and work. That means starting early and finishing late each day, and squeezing as much adventure as possible in between. That's our desire, anyway. Our plan. Sometimes plans fall apart when they meet with reality.

That happened a bit yesterday. Yesterday morning I was feeling a bit achy, so we shuffled our plans a bit. Instead of doing a big, aggressive hike on Thursday and some lighter-duty high desert stuff on Friday, we did the high desert stuff yesterday and saved the aggressive hike for today. The high desert stuff was fun so it's not like we were accepting second prize. We were just changing up the order of adventures.

What happened yesterday happened even moreso today. Today I slept in 'til after 9am when I'd planned to get up at 6:45. I just couldn't get up that early. It's because I had trouble getting to sleep last night and was awake until after 2am. And today Hawk was feeling unwell. Plus the weather was crummy. The sky was threatening rain until at least mid-morning, and the forecast called for clouds all day. We decided to put off the big, challenging hike another today.

An inviting hot tub at the Days Inn Bend, Oregon (Jul 2025)

Putting off the hike doesn't mean doing nothing, though. Hawk went shopping at a local rock shop while I puttered around the hotel room, eating a late breakfast of leftovers from the other night and taking it easy inside. When she got back we went out to the hot tub together. The rain the sky was threatening with not only hadn't materialized, but the sky started clearing up, too.

Enjoying the hot tub and pool at the hotel in Bend (Jul 2025)

I already knew the hot tub would be enjoyable for a soak as I'd used two nights ago. But today we also tried the pool. It's surprisingly warm, I'd estimate at least 90° F (32° C). Hawk found the pool warm enough to be therapeutic and did walking laps back and forth. I preferred the even hotter water in the hot tub to ease my slightly sore muscles.

Hawk later joined me in the hot tub for a soak. After that we were both hungry for lunch. We found a Mexican cafe with casual service nearby and ate there.

Now we're back at our hotel room after lunch. It occurs to me that although the weather forecast is still calling for gloom all day, it's been wrong for the past 4 hours. The sky outside looks fairly nice even as the weather report says it's all cloudy.

I'm starting to think maybe we should try to salvage some adventure from this stay-local day. I mean, taking it easy is nice, but I can take it easy around the pool at home. While I have the opportunity to be here I should take advantage of it! The day's more than half over already, so that forecloses a lot of the possibilities. But there's got to be something we can do other than just sit around all day....

canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #15
Bend, OR - Thu, 3 Jul 2025, 8:30pm

We're back from another fun day of vacation in the Oregon Cascades. Though today we weren't really in the Oregon Cascades.... Instead we headed east from Bend into the high desert volcanic scrub land. Along the way we explored mountains of glass, hiked a volcanic fissure in the ground... oh, and saw about 100 hawks.


 
We saw the first few dozen hawks as we were driving east on US 20 out of Bend toward Glass Butte. The hawks were perched on power line poles along the side of the highway. At first we didn't see any raptors. Then we saw one or two. "Huh, I'm surprised there's food out here for them," I thought to myself. The we started seeing them every half mile. There must be plenty of food for them! I've only seen this density of birds of prey in the wild twice before.

We arrived in the area of the Glass Buttes and turned off the highway. From there we'd see only dirt and gravel roads for the next few hours. Yay, choosing to drive our own car (4x4 SUV) instead of flying and renting a car! We drove around to sites specifically where Hawk could rock-hound for different varieties of obsidian. She filled a canvas tote bag.

After rock-hounding and eating a trail lunch in the car we drove back out to the highway and backtracked a bit to the west before leaving the highway again to traverse gravel and dirt roads for most of the next 50 miles to get to Crack-in-the-Ground, an interesting volcanic fissure. From there we parked the car at the trail head, strapped on our packs, and hiked over 2 miles, much of it in narrow a chasm up to 70 feet deep. As with yesterday's summary I'm skipping over sharing photos (and video!) for now to keep from falling too far behind in writing about this trip.

Oh, and we at least a dozen more hawks on the drive to Crack-in-the-Ground. Plus another dozen more as we drove to the remote little town of Christmas Valley afterwards for a light dinner. Yes, it was already after 6pm! Then there were lots more hawks as we drove west toward Fort Rock and Hole in the Ground.

Yes, there's a Hole in the Ground in addition to Crack-in-the-Ground. We didn't get to see the hole, though, because it was raining by the time we got there. It was raining— pouring, really, with occasional lightning in the sky— as we passed by Fort Rock, as well. These both would've been fun to see. Alas, maybe on a return trip to Bend a few years from now!

Update, 11pm: the rain and lightning hit us in Bend later in the evening, spoiling yet another part of our plans for the day. Having gotten back to our hotel around 8:30pm we looked forward to soaking in the hot tub before it closes at 10. Well, at 9:15 or so when we were ready to go, WHOOSH! rain started to fall. We thought maybe we'd wait it out but then CRACK! lightning. And the rain lasted for 2 hours. It's a bummer we didn't get to use the hot tub. My sore muscles would've appreciated it.

canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #13
Bend, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 9:30pm

Our Day 2 of this Oregon Cascades vacation has been a very full and fulfilling one. Yesterday was only a part day of vacation because it was also a work day (for me). But today we spent the whole day on leisure, leaving our hotel around 9am and not returning until after 9pm. In the middle we did 3 hikes, visited 6 waterfalls— or maybe more; I lost count— and drove 187 miles.


We left our room at the Days Inn in Bend around 9am. Yeah, we slept in a bit today. I swatted the snooze button until almost 7:30 then took my time getting ready after that. A curious thing is that when we were loading our car just before 9 we saw what late risers we were. The hotel parking lot, which was full last night, was now 75% empty, and half the remaining cars had doors and trunks open with people buzzing around them, loading bikes, coolers, etc. I'll add that to my notes about the Days Inn brand: this one, at least, is popular with the outdoors activity demographic. Unlike, say, the tweaker and drug dealer demographic.

Our first hike of the day was Tumalo Falls, not far outside of Bend to the west. I'll save my notes about the trek and pics of the waterfall for when I write a full blog about it. For now it's added to my backlog so I don't fall further behind in writing about this trip. Long story short, though, Tumalo was amazing. The main falls was almost 100' tall, and there were additional waterfalls higher up on the trail.

After hiking Tumalo it was lunchtime. Being not far from Bend was a plus because we could drive back into town to eat some real food instead of protein bars and water from our trail rations. We found a frou-frou burger place on the west side of town. Hawk got a custom burger made to her specifications with avocado, while I enjoyed a lamb burger with feta cheese and tzatziki sauce.

Fueled up for the next several hours we headed northwest on US 20 over the Santiam pass. Our destination was Downing Creek Falls. The trail description I found on a blog written by a local gal said it was hard to find. She did not lie. We overshot the unmarked dirt road twice. Then, once on it, it was a narrow two-track with no signs of where to go. Between her blog and notes on AllTrails.com we found the right place and enjoyed a stunning falls all to ourselves.

After Downing Creek we headed south back toward the pass and then down into the canyon of the headwaters of the McKenzie River. We then turn back east and headed back uphill toward the McKenzie Pass. Along the way we stopped to hike Proxy Falls. Proxy Falls has both an upper and lower falls on a loop trail. The lower falls is the bigger of the two but is hard to see from the trail. We made up for that by scrambling down a hill, off trail, then walking on logs across a creek, then wet-footing it out into the creek at the bottom of the falls to gaze up at it. Wow. I hope the photos I'll share soon turn out as amazing as the falls did in person.

As we finished hiking at Proxy Falls it was already getting late— almost 6:30pm. We thought we'd just drive up over the McKenzie Pass and down to Bend for dinner. Or maybe stop 20 minutes early in the small town of Sisters. But when we got to the top of the pass the views forced us to stop. Atop the pass, the winding little state highway traverses a lava field. There's nothing but lava rock visible in any direction— except for the tall volcanic peaks in the distance on all sides! And, at the top of the pass, there's an observatory... that's made out of volcanic rock. We couldn't resist stopping and seeing that in the golden light of the setting sun.

Somehow the stark beauty of the McKenzie Pass sated our appetites just long enough to drive back down into Bend. We picked out a Mexican restaurant for dinner and enjoyed plates of enchiladas there. Afterward we ran a few errands: buying groceries for the next day and filling the car with gas. We're back late this evening, but we're planning to get out early tomorrow for a big hike.
canyonwalker: Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. Travel! (planes trains and automobiles)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #6
Bend, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 8am

We're trying something kind of new for us on this trip. We're staying at Days Inn. Actually we're staying at two of them. Monday night we stayed at the Days Inn in Klamath Falls— yes, the one with the tweaker and possible drug dealer loitering in the parking lot at midnight— and last night and for the next few nights we're staying at the Days Inn in Bend.

What's the deal with Days Inn being "kind of new" for us? One thing is that I haven't been collecting points or elite status with its parent company, Wyndham. I have points and status with Marriott, Hilton, and IHG. I also have points with Best Western and Choice hotels— leftovers from scattered visits in the past— but not elite status. But really it's the reason why I don't have points or status with Wyndham that counts. Wyndham has a bunch of lower end hotel brands, and I've found them too hit-or-miss to want to stay at.

Logo for Days Inn by Wyndham hotelsThe Days Inn brand in particular has had a couple of misses for me. One amusing one is that when I booked a Days Inn about 15 years ago— yes, that's the most recent time before this week I stayed with this brand— the hotel turned out to have a cobbled-together collection of mismatching furniture in every room. I knew that because the manager let me visit several rooms when I arrived and pick the one I liked best. Different beds, different sofas and chairs, different dressers and night stands.... Every room was unique— and not in a good way!

But that experience is merely amusing. The one that's frustrating happened a few years before that, when Hawk and I stayed at a Days Inn near Yellowstone National Park. The room was terrible. It was dark like a cave (the "window" opened into a hallway that had been enclosed), the sheets on the bed were dirty, and the carpet was wet. Like, it went squish-squish-squish as we walked across the floor. 🤮

The problem went beyond just one bad room or a few bad rooms. The hotel also fell way short on service recovery. When I brought these issues to the manager and requested another room, they told me the only rooms with better windows and better carpet were upgrades and I'd have to pay to switch to one of them. I decided immediately that if I was paying to switch I'd pay to switch to a whole better hotel. I walked out. I have spend over 2,000 nights in hotels since then, and that Days Inn is one of only 2 times I've chosen to walk out.

So, how have these two recent Days Inn experiences been? Thankfully they've been way better than either of those previous two! The Klamath Falls hotel was a decent one, for a budget hotel. The exterior was drab but the interiors had been redone recently. And it had a pool and a hot tub... not that I had time to use them.

The Bend hotel also looks dowdy on the outside, like a relic motor lodge from the 1970s. Inside it's also more modern... but still, there's no mistaking it for anything but a budget motel. And the floor here does go squish-squish when I walk on it.... That's not because the carpet's soaked but because the vinyl wood-like flooring (there's no carpet) likely has a cushioning underneath that was cheaply installed.

We've got 4 nights at the Days Inn here in Bend. I'll share more thoughts as this stay progresses. So far it looks like we'll actually stay here all 4 nights! 🤣

canyonwalker: Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. Travel! (planes trains and automobiles)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #5
Bend, OR - Tue, 1 Jul 2025, 10pm

We faced in choice in how to travel for this trip: whether to fly or drive. As you can tell from what I've written so far, we drove. But it wasn't simple choice. Both flying and driving had both pluses and minuses.

The biggest issues were in the time-money tradeoff:

  • Flying would've meant less time in transit overall, even with flying to PDX and then having to drive 3 hours to Bend. By flying, we would've left home about the same time on Monday afternoon and then gotten to Bend around midnight— the same time we got to Klamath Falls driving. And from Klamath Falls it was another 2.5 hours of driving today to get to Bend. Flying would've held a similar time savings on the way home.

  • It's worth pointing out also that time in the car is "windshield" time— meaning I'm actively engaged in the act of driving. I can't relax with a beer or scroll on my phone, like I can at the airport and aboard a flight.

  • OTOH, flying would've been more expensive. The flight outbound I was able to get on points for a reasonable rate, but the flight home was a cash purchase— a "hard" cost. The rental car was also a hard cost. These two cash-out-of-pocket costs were nearly $1,000. The outbound flight cost something too, but I got it on points, of which I have a bazillion (okay, approximately 650,000) on Southwest Airlines, so it's a soft cost. Likewise there's a cost for wear and tear on our car— but it's also a soft cost, as the car is 14 years old with 129,000 miles. It's not depreciating anymore, so the soft cost is just the cost of keeping it running.


There were also convenience factors, all of which argued in favor of driving:

  • Driving is our car, so there are no surprises at the rental lot. In particular, a rental could be more or less comfortable than our own car. Hawk especially prefers comfort parameters she knows vs. the crap-shoot of renting.

  • Driving gives us more latitude to change plans if we feel like it, including visiting things elsewhere in Oregon or in California on the way home Sunday— which we already plan to do.

  • Driving our own car means we have known, solid 4x4 capabilities. Some of the hikes we're considering require driving on forest roads to get to them.

  • Last but not least, driving our own car means we can pack whatever the hell we want. It doesn't have to fit neatly into a small number of suitcases. Among other things we wouldn't take while flying, we packed an insulated bag with cold drink and cheese. That plus crackers and dried sausage makes good breakfasts for me.


So far I'd say driving has been a slight win. Yes, only slight, because despite the significant number of pluses that favor driving over flying, that first one—saving hours of time— is a big one favoring flying.
canyonwalker: wiseguy (Default)
Oregon Cascades Travelog #4
Bend, OR - Tue, 1 Jul 2025, 8:30pm

It's been a good first day of our vacation in the Oregon Cascades. After starting this first day of my vacation with a day of work from a hotel in Klamath Falls, Hawk met me back at the room after she finished her shopping fun and we drove northward toward Bend, stopping to hike at Paulina Falls in the Newberry Crater Volcanic National Monument along the way. The blog for those waterfalls is currently in my backlog, awaiting attention on the photos. I'll share it soon.

After Paulina Falls we tried to visit another falls on the way to Bend but got rained out. For that matter we were almost rained out of Paulina. We hiked those falls despite a gray sky, drizzle, and rumbling thunder(!). By the time we got close to the other falls the sky was dark and the rain was falling a lot faster than a drizzle. We pulled the plug and got back on the road to Bend.

In Bend we checked into our hotel, another Days Inn like the one in Klamath Falls— but without tweakers or drug dealers loitering in the parking lot. We stowed our bags in the room and headed out right away for dinner.

Deschutes Brewery & Restaurant in Bend, Oregon (Jul 2025)

Hawk wasn't feeling too particular on dinner, other than "no pizza/Italian", and left the choice mostly up to me. I took the opportunity to pick something genuinely interesting to me— a brewpub! In this case the Deschutes Brewery & Public House. It's just over 1/2 mile from our hotel. And it has pizza, which I enjoyed eating, plus not-pizza that fulfilled Hawk's preferences. She ordered a gut-busting burger with guacamole with french fries with barbecue sauce.

Along with my pizza I enjoyed a few glasses of beer. The standout among them was one of the brewery-only specials, a limited anniversary edition of their Obsidian Stout made with bourbon. It tasted kind of like a beer Manhattan, but in a really good way. It was too rich to enjoy with food so I save the glass for dessert, after drinking a few pints of regular beer with my pizza. 🍕🍺😋

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