So- On FB I left off on The Dalles. GORGEOUS! We stayed at the Shilo Inn right on the Dalles Dam! If you are in that area- stay there for sure!
This Shilo Inn has three interesting sights to see on-site.
1) The Hole in the Rock (behind hotel)
2) The old Indian ruins that you can walk through!
3) The Ladies- two gorgeous wood carved lady poles holding up a fabulous wooden bar- all of it came from very far away and rested right inside the bar of the hotel! (Bar was closed for breakfast!)
We then traveled from The Dalles Dam over West to Multnomah Falls! WOW!!!! Incredible!
It is a bummer we had to hurry through, due to a 7+ hour drive down to Crater Lake that same morning, because they had a Jr. Ranger program too! (Cope and Tierney have become Jr. Rangers in each of the National Parks we have gone to)
Simply breathtaking and sooooo worth the drive over!
On the way to Crater Lake- you GOTTA stop by this gas station/store! Two guys own it and they are hysterical!
Their dad is from Palm Desert!
Crater Lake was really breathtaking and one cannot describe the color of deep, illuminated sapphire blue...it was one of those places you could just sit and stare at it all day long!
We planned on camping there 2 days, but cut it short due to the mega-amount of Zombie mosquitoes that were there.
Evidently, when they have a late snow, and the snow starts to melt away, that is when the mosquitoes flourish. (bummer) We couldn't even enjoy our campsite- there were so many! In our campsite alone there was atleast 51,931 at last count.It wasn't nearly so bad traveling out around the rim and stopping at all the vistas! We went to the 6 major ones and a few in-between. The kids even became Jr. Rangers for the 3rd time! As a bonus, they got to help the Ranger make a mock caldera and see how Crater Lake was formed. They loved it and it really helped them to understand how this beautiful feature was formed.
So onto our next stop- Klamath Falls. Really pretty drive is the 62 leaving the south entrance of Crater Lake and straight into Klamath Falls. Word has it there used to be falls here, until they damed up the water and the falls quit running. Oh well. We are at a wonderful Shilo Inn and have enjoyed the pool, the hot tub and are about to enjoy a free drink on the house. (Me and Jeff, not the kids) We also went to the old downtown section and ate at a wonderful Mexican restaurant called Hildalgo's..... very yummy and on the left side of the main town road almost to 4th street. I highly recommend it. Looks like a hole in the wall-but those are usually the best places to eat!
Tomorrow we will travel a short distance to the Lava Beds National Monument....not sure if we will camp again, so if you don't hear from me...and I didnt post pics on FB, then I didn't get internet! :)
There are a ton of things to do here! Check it out! (Thanks Alison!!)
Also we plan on caving! Here is a partial list of caves to check out!
More later!
1 comment:
Glad to get your update, really sounds like some interesting places. To bad about the bugs, oh well you can't win them all.
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