July 10-17, 2011 – Crooked River Ranch and Redmond, OR

Sunday, July 10th, we hooked up and headed south to Terrebonne which is 5 miles north of Redmond.   The scenery has changed drastically from our trip up the coast.  This is the dry side of Oregon with hilly prairie lands covered with wheat fields, sagebrush and a few small trees.  The river gorges we passed were beautiful and the rivers were full of whitewater rafters.

We have parked the rig in Doug and Barb’s driveway, friends of ours who used to live in Colorado.  They live in the largest housing development in Oregon with 2500 lots ranging from 1 to 5 acres, called Crooked River Ranch.  Many of the lots have beautiful views of the Crooked River Gorge and the Deschutes River Gorge.

Monday we took a day off to do some chores (laundry, wash the 5th wheel) and visit with Doug and Barb.  Rex helped Doug put up a screen door.  Their lot is one acre and the dogs really enjoyed running in their big back yard and playing with their dog, Shasta.  Cody tried to play with their cat, Silver, but she wasn’t interested.

Tuesday, July 12th we all went hiking at Smith Rock State Park just outside of Terrebonne.  This park is a very popular climbing area.  We watched some climbers scale the cliffs above the trail.








We hiked along the Crooked River to this rock formation called Monkey Face Rock because it looks like a monkey looking off to the right.






On the way back to the parking lot we saw these two fawns watching us beside the trail.  The one on the left was very curious about who or what we were.  We watched them for a while but decided we had better move on before mom showed up.


The weather was beautiful and we had a great hike.





Wednesday morning Doug and Barb had things to do so we drove to Newberry National Volcanic Monument.  We stopped at the visitor center and learned about the volcanic activity in this area.  Newberry Volcano is a shield-shaped volcanic complex covering over 1,200 square miles.  The Newberry caldera is a 17 square mile basin within Newberry Volcano that formed around 75,000 years ago.  We drove up to the Lava Butte Crater and got this great view of Three Sisters peaks.







If you look closely there is a trail going through this large lava field below the Butte.









Lava Butte Crater is 180 feet deep.


When we got back to the visitors center we ran into Denny and Dee, friends from our RV Park in Arizona who live in Colorado Springs.  Doug and Barb are mutual friends and Denny & Dee are also visiting them and attending the Good Sam Rally in Redmond.

Down the road a ways but still in the Newberry National Volcanic monument we visited the Lava River Cave.  Lava River Cave was one of the first lava tubes to be discovered in Oregon.  It extends in two directions from the entrance.  The main tube is the longest known uncollapsed lava tube in Oregon at over a mile long.  We climbed down many stairs from the entrance to the bottom.



There are no lights in the cave and everyone has to have two sources of light before being allowed in the cave.  You can rent gas lanterns or bring your own light.  Needless to say it was very dark and hard to negotiate the cave floor using just a flashlight.

At the end of the cave the tunnel is filled with sand and you have to crawl on your hands and knees – this is where we decided to stop and turned around.  We enjoyed the hike but were glad to get back outside to the warm sunlight - the cave stays at a constant 41 degrees.

Thursday through Sunday we attended the 12th Annual Good Sam RV Rally held at the Deschutes County Fair & Expo Center in Redmond. Barb & Doug and Dee & Denny also attended the rally.  We went to seminars every day and walked through the vendor area many times looking at all they had to offer that we do not need.  We attended concerts by Bobby Vinton and Herman Hermits starring Peter Noone.  Vince Gill performed on Friday night but when we arrived at the outdoor arena it started pouring rain.  We waited for about 30 minutes and it did not let up and started lightening.  People were leaving the arena and buses were taking them back to their camp sites so we assumed the concert was cancelled and left.  The next day we found out they just postponed it by an hour until the rain eased up - we are sorry we missed it even though we are not country western fans.   We enjoyed Bobby Vinton but his music was a little before our time.  We enjoyed Peter Noone much more as we listened to the Herman’s Hermits growing up and Peter Noone was very entertaining and funny.  We had a great time at the rally but were glad when it ended as we were very tired.

We really enjoyed our time with Doug and Barb and it was great to see Denny and Dee again. We thank Doug and Barb for letting us stay in their driveway and for their great hospitality.




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