30 Saturday Oct 2021
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After seeing the north side of the peninsula, I headed southwest to Kalalock. This is a campground I remember as a kid going to a number of times in the winter. Yup – in the winter. My mom would heard that a storm was coming and off we went to camp at the Kalalock campground in our Siesta trailer. We would then walk the beach looking for glass fishing floats caught in the logs. And we found a few not broken.
24 Sunday Oct 2021
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This trip would be different. There would be no searching for the middle of nowhere. I left Seattle a month later then my usual time for a fall trip and snow had already fallen on Snoqualmie Pass making travel eastward seem cold. So I headed west to the Olympic Peninsula.
27 Saturday Feb 2021
Posted in Uncategorized, Winter 2021
In the early evening, a clanging noise from my metal trailer step startled the dogs and got them barking. Hum, I thought it must be the metal contracting as the air cooled. I looked outside into the dark and didn’t see anything. The next night about the same time I heard quiet metal noises on/off for a half an hour. Once again I looked outside and didn’t see anything. I kept looking outside. All I could think of, was that a RV had joined me at my camp site but I didn’t see them. I had found this camp site on the web so it wasn’t a secret place. Ghost campers? But when I took the dogs out for their 8:00 pm piss/poop walk there was no new campers at my spot. Hum. A mystery.
The next morning I found small scat left on my outdoor rug. Phil told me he had seen fox in the area. Perhaps fox scat? The metal noise could have come from my dog fence as the animal scurried around maybe investigation the dog smells.
16 Wednesday Oct 2019
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When I asked people for a recommendation of what to do around John Day, the first recommendation almost everyone made was that I should go to Strawberry Lake.
Strawberry Lake
15 Tuesday Oct 2019
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I headed south, wandering around looking for fall color, fossils, and views.
Larches
06 Sunday Oct 2019
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I’m staying at John Day for the month of October volunteering at Kam Wah Chung. While there I’m exploring the area.
The tourist brochure for Grant County listed the top 20 tourist sights and included the Humongous Fungus with a note to see the chamber of commerce or forest service for more information. My interest was perked. The Humongous Fungus was in the top 20 sites to visit in Grant County! I located the chamber of commerce office and went in to get the information on this interesting site. The gentleman there had heard of it but couldn’t find any information on it. He couldn’t remember if he had ever visited it. He suggested I visit the forest service office, so off I went. At the forest service office the lady looked around a bit and then found the information for me. Then she pointed on the map (that she gave me) where I should go to see the Humongous Fungus. When I pointed out to her that the area wasn’t where the map located the Humongous Fungus, her reply was: “it is all the same.” I was getting more intrigued about the Humongous Fungus. It didn’t appear to be a hot tourist spot.
Armillaria ostoyae, the humongous fungus. Photo from Scientific America.
29 Sunday Sep 2019
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Another abandoned ranch. Without a plan, this seems to be a theme for this trip. In this fast world, it is calming to see items made by hand slowly. I slowly look at how things were cobbled together. Yet I imagine that the Riddles may have found pleasure in our easy to purchase manufactured world. They had a hard life.
A short walk west of the Riddle buildings.
28 Saturday Sep 2019
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I stopped at the Malheur NWR headquarters for information. I knew this time of year wasn’t prime for bird watching but I had seen so many birds at the Tule NWR, maybe there would be lots of birds here. I asked, “Do you recommend taking the auto tour?” Other visitors overheard me and answered my question with, “No way. It is a waste of time.” But on Saturday, I drove the south portion of the auto tour and throughly enjoying it.
27 Friday Sep 2019
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The Steens Mountain seems like a huge ramp extending from Frenchglen to the sky. It is bigger than imaginable – a Jack In the Beanstalk fairytale size of ramp. It gently goes up and up and the Steen Loop road provides the path to drive.
The Steens Loop Road at about 9,000 ft. Big country.
23 Monday Sep 2019
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I took a walk to Kenny Camp in the Sheldon NWR. It was an enjoyable walk there. An interesting look aound, and an enjoyable walk back. Simple.
The house.
searching for the middle of nowhere 