Tag: rving baby

Riffe Lake and Mt Rainier

After Portland we found an awesome spot on Riffe Lake that was beautiful and surrounded on all sides by mountains. It was a pretty popular spot as it seemed a lot of locals came out for the day and to camp.  It is also a landing zone for hang gliders. It was entertaining to watch them glide back and forth so quietly in the air.  They made it look easy!  The boondocking spots are just a mile or two from Taidnapam Park where we also were able to dump and get more fresh water for $5….Well actually it was only dumping but we sneakily got some fresh water too, leave a comment if you want to know how.

We went hiking around our campsite. Apparently the water level on Riffe Lake is low at this time and we were hiking around what appeared to be old building foundations.  Was there a town buried under the lake?  There were big trees that had fallen and made for some cool photos.  We were trying to hike to an old cabin but every time we tried to find the path to it, it disappeared! We called it the Blair Witch cabin and said forget it.  It was too creepy how it kept disappearing.

The drive to the Nisqually enterance of Mt. Rainier National Park only took about 40 minutes from Riffe Lake.  At first we felt like we were driving through West Virginia as we passed by some of the locals homes.  Once we reached the park we had some gorgeous views.  When we got to Paradise visitor center it started snowing and we couldn’t see the mountain at all. We ended up going for a hike on one of the only trails open (which was covered in snow) and let Zygi play in it. Unfortunately all the footage we took for Zygi’s first snow experience got deleted because of my Chinese fleece lined pants. The skin on my thigh touches on my phone in my pocket and ended up resetting my phone because it tried to unlock it to many times.

We also went on a hike to The Grove of the Patriarchs which had some absolutely massive trees. They were Douglas firs, western hemlocks and western red cedars. Some of them were 1000 years old! We haven’t seen trees this big since we saw the Sequoias in California. It was a beautiful hike and we probably would have had it to ourselves but they were training seasonal rangers that day and they were sitting along the trail interviewing each other. It was still amazing, there is just something about trees like that which really impresses you. Victoria says she can feel the energy coming from the old trees.

We never got to see Mount Rainier.  She hid behind the clouds the whole time we were there.  Even on the day we left we saw a tiny glimpse of the behemoth but not the whole mountain. We were a little disappointed, but we had a good time anyways.  We got to play in the snow with Zygi and saw some giant trees.

Can I get a ride?

Next up, crossing the border into CANADA!

  • Writers: Tim and Victoria
  • Photographs, mostly Victoria’s but I took some too, with her directions, lol

 

Portland Part 2

The last time we were in Portland we wrote a bit about how we loved the city but that the quantity of bums and how aggressive they were really spoiled it for us. I have to say that I don’t know if they cleaned it up but we didn’t have anyone aggressively bumming from us. Yes, there were still some bums and some tents but it didn’t feel like they were everywhere. We were really excited to come back and get some awesome street food and a nice hot shower at the RV park.  We also needed to pick up some stuff we ordered from Amazon at one of the many Amazon lockers they have in the city.

On of the trains downtown

Portland to me is one of the coolest cities in the west coast, awesome food scene, giant bike lanes, and good public transit. There also happens to be a very nice rv park in a good location to stay at, called the Columbia River RV Park. It’s next to the river and is only a mile from the closest train station and a mile and a half from a park and ride. You can also drive downtown and park pretty cheaply at the city run parking garages if your only going for a few hours, it cost $5 for around 3 hours. Parking garages make me feel glad not to have a 4×4, we just made it in with our antenna scraping each beam.

Besides all of the awesome restaurants Portland is famous for a foot cart square downtown where you can get good, cheap, authentic food from about 10 or 15 different cultures. Victoria heard about Nong’s Khao Man Gai for it’s famous chicken rice. Then we went to Persian Sofreh to get a Gyro type wrap, it had authentic lamb meat with some delicious homemade tzatziki and hot sauce. It was also much easier to split. The we were full so we went for a nice walk along the river and then came back, still full, and got some stuff to go. I got some rice porridge aka Congee at Bao Bao.  Congee is serve all over southeast Asia and China that is usually breakfast food, and sometimes baby food… Anyways it’s simple but fantastic and is not served at many places so I had to get some while I could. Victoria went to a Korean food stand and got her favorite, spicy chicken teriyaki, she just can’t say no to it.

Later that day we went and met up with an old college friend of mine and his wife. I hadn’t seen him in probably ten years, we lived on the same hall, 2N, in the freshman dorms in Russell Hall at the University of Georgia. We went to Beachside Brewery and I had a cider and Victoria had a pilsner. For food, we got a pretzel (Which was good but not $9 good…) and a Cuban sandwich which was good but didn’t real remind us of a Cuban sandwich. Not enough pickles and mustard and the bread wasn’t pressed. We had a great time and Zygi did pretty good for his first brewery experience.  Unfortunately none of us took any pictures (I guess we were enjoying ourselves too much).

I was impressed with how thick the roots were on the tree.

Next up is Mount Rainier National Park.

Celilo Park – Train Horns and Wind Storms on The Columbia River Gorge

Since Memorial Day was coming up and we don’t make reservations we had to be a little creative in where we could stay. First I tried all the national forest campgrounds in Northwest Oregon and Southwest Washington. There were 500 campgrounds including primitive. Amazingly every single spot in all 500 parks was reserved for the weekend. So then we started looking for first come first serve sites. We’d be arriving on a Wednesday so we’d beat out most people for those spots. Unfortunately there were very few spots, maybe 6 total, some of those a ways out of the way for us. Then I came across a COE park called Celilio right on the Columbia River Gorge, it looked beautiful, nice trees and grass in an area that is pretty desert like, they said they had spots for 30 or 40 campers and they were all first come first serve. It sounded perfect but there was one warning, there were two train tracks about a 100 ft from the parking area and since the entrance crossed the tracks they had to lay on the horn as they passed.

When we got there on Wednesday there were only only three other campers that were there and we got a pretty sweet spot where the back half of the trailer would be shaded by trees but the solar panels at the front would still get light basically all day. It was a pretty nice sunny day with maybe only 10 mph winds when we got there and and we walked around and checked out the park.  It has a set of bathrooms but unfortunately the water spigot is chained shut. One nice thing that they offered were free life jackets to borrow they even had one Zygi’s size, so we planned to go kayaking.

Unfortunately the weather changed for the worse the rest of the time we were there, it was generally pretty sunny but unfortunately the winds were a steady 20 to 30 mph with gusts to 40 mph for the next few days. The Columbia River Gorge is famous for it’s wind and therefore famous for it’s wind surfing. In fact someone had set the sailing speed record on one of them in the Gorge, clocking in at over 70 mph. However a few years ago that was beat by a 75 mph run done by a specially designed carbon fiber racing sailboat. Anyways we did get to see some of the wind surfers but it seemed like it was even a bit much for them some of the times. Therefore with our solar panels cranking out more energy than our batteries could take we figured we’d take some time and enjoy a bit of tv (I’ve got all of The Amazing Races on my hard drive 😉

After a day or two of that we were bored and were able to find a spot where there were enough trees and bushes that if you were sitting down you could get out of the wind. I setup a tarp on the ground over there and let Zygi zoom around and play with the grass, sticks, pine cones, and rocks. It was a great way for him to let out some energy.  Zygi didn’t seem to mind the trains too much. Sometimes one would scare him but then we would say, “Chooooo Choo!” with a smile and he would be ok.

 

We attempted to visit The Dalles Dam. Victoria had read on tripadvisor that you could take a tour of the dam and ride on a train from the visitor center. Unfortunately when we arrived the dam visitor center was closed and we didn’t get any dam tour.  After a quick google search, we then discovered that they didn’t offer the train ride anymore since it derailed with a few tourists on it. Sooo we just decided to walk around the dam visitor center and take the dam trail as far as it let us go.

We did have one successful day while visiting the area. We decided we needed to get away from the wind and trains and check out Tamanawas Falls. It was about an hour drive but well worth it, even on Memorial Day weekend with hundreds of other people. On the way, we saw magnificent views of Mt Hood since it was a clear day. We hiked 3 miles out and back to see Tamanawas Falls. It was pretty cool because you could actually hike and sit completely behind the falls. That part was too rocky, slick and steep to climb with the baby so Victoria stayed behind while and I climbed back there and got a few photos for her.

The classic northwest forest was amazing to be in after days in the desert looking part of Eastern Oregon. Even with all the people, we were able to find our own area of the river to have lunch by climbing down off the trail a little bit. It even had a little pool area where you could get in the water. Unfortunately it was the coldest water I’ve ever been in, straight snow melt from Mt Hood. My feet and calves were numb before I had the chance to go any further so I just rinsed off there and got out carefully so as to not hurt my feet. We both loved the trail and I can’t imagine how much nicer it would be on a calm weekday.

After staying five days so we could avoid any problems with finding a spot we were ready to leave and I had a friend I wanted to visit from the old college dorm days, Ron from 2N! Therefore we decided to stay at an RV park we had stayed at before in Portland. It’s a very nice park just off the river and only a mile from a light rail station to take you into downtown. Next up, our return to Portland!

He get’s his feet from his dad…

Bulls Bend CG: Drivin’ Down the Scary Dirt Road to Heaven.

Victoria was looking for a boondocking spot near Bend Oregon using the Days End Directory and was having trouble finding something that sounded good. So I broke out my Oregon Benchmark Topo Map book to look up the National forest and BLM land in the area to see what they have for primitive campgrounds or even dispersed camping. I found an awesome sounding spot called Bulls Bend Campground in Deschutes National Forest. They said it would fit up to 50 ft trailers, had excellent cell service, was rarely used, and was beautiful as it was on a particularly tight oxbow in the river so we would have water on three sides of us.

We first stopped in at La Pine St Park which offered free dumping and fresh water.  I can’t rely on the gauges since they have never worked but I can now kind of tell how much water we have (70 Gallons)  based on the sound of the water pump but nothing I can do about the grey tanks (20 gallons each), the black tank is huge (70 gallons I believe) and we can go weeks so we don’t worry about that one. It’s no fun to run out of water or fill up your grey tanks when you’re out in the middle of nowhere. We conserve our water, shower every few days or wash off in the river or lake if we’re by one. Sometimes we will use that water for washing the dishes.  We honestly probably could have made it but why chance it when it’s free, and pretty much on the way?

Then it was time to head down to the campground. There was a nice large gravel road that we turned on, but wait a minute they have it gated off…  I talked to someone else who was doing the same thing and he said they lived there and came out all the time and the gate was never closed. He however did mention there was another way in and he didn’t want to try it in his 4×4 Toyota and 20 ft bumper pull. So after several very awkward turns around (I’ve gotten much better at least) we found the road in.  It was very narrow, just wide enough for our trailer and we had no way to know if we could make it. Was it tall enough? Was it wide enough the whole way? Did the turns have enough space? Was it all hard packed or were we going to find soft sand? We tried to call the ranger station to ask these questions but conveniently they are closed on weekends, very helpful…

We sat there for a good five minutes discussing what to do. Victoria didn’t want to go, I said screw it I want to stay here and we’ve been looking for this place for an hour. The whole way it was just tall enough that we got a few light brushes on the roof, just wide enough that we on a very light brushes on the trailer, just rough enough that we weren’t sure if our dishes would still be in the cabinets and the turns just wide enough that if I was any longer we would have sideswiped trees. But we did make it!  We had a beautiful spot on the river and the only visible damage was a plastic piece pulled off the bumper which I quickly screwed back in to space.

A view of our camper looking back from the river. Even with the trees we got plenty of solar power.

There was only one other person staying there in a jeep.  We saw some other people drive through all just in cars not another RV in sight much less a 35 ft fifth wheel, lol. The spot was beautiful and the oxbow was so tight that at one spot the river was ten ft away from itself. We thought about getting the kayak out and just floating it, do the 10 ft portage and do it again. Unfortunately we didn’t have a life jacket for Zygi and the current was running strong, so we decided against it (We bought one in the next town so we’ll be ready next time).

So we mostly just hung out on the river and enjoyed the beautiful weather. Even being parked in the woods we got plenty of solar power, no generator needed, as designed (I do have a 2000 watt champion inverter generator just in case, I’ve had to run power tools off the generator before but that’s the extent in 3 years of living on our fifth wheel). We also had excellent cell service as mentioned so we could talk to family and friends, post/work on articles, and plan our next spots. We also walked the closed road. There were four small trees blocking the road. It might take a half day for two rangers to clear. The least they could do was post a warning on the website that the main road is closed and that large RVs are not advisable except for the brave ;).

Beautiful baby

After a 3 days and nights it was time to move on, we had to get somewhere well in advance of Memorial Day since we don’t make reservations 6 months or a year in advance.

Next, The Columbia River Gorge till the Memorial Day Holiday is over.

  • Author: Tim
  • Editor: Victoria
  • Photographer: Victoria

Crater Lake National Park

We were on the fence on which route we should take through Oregon.  Last time we came through on our way to Seattle we took the coastal route up US 1. We ultimately decided to go up through the middle of Oregon via highway 97 because we really wanted to see Crater Lake and Mount Hood. The drive was so gorgeous passing through Ponderosa pine forests with large snow capped mountains in the background.

Mount Shasta

We decided to camp at Hagelstein County Park in Klamath Falls.  The location was convenient being right off 97 and within an hour of Crater Lake National Park. Hagelstein park is large enough to fit any size rig and fairly nice as far as a park right off a highway can be. Unfortunately the spigot for water was turned off, for whatever reason. Instead you were supposed to use a fresh water spring. So unless you have a water pump system or like using water jugs to fill you tanks with somewhat questionable water, be sure to bring your own water. Good thing we always do. The park was big enough for twelve or probably even more large rigs but there were mostly tent campers and car campers. The best spot faces the pond.  It was entertaining to watch the local marmot go about his work building a nest and ducks digging head first for food. It always makes me chuckle to watch them with their butts in the air and legs kicking while they dig with their beaks underwater.

We got up the next day and drove 45 minutes to Crater Lake National Park, which was absolutely stunning. Because there was so much snow, the north and east side of the park was closed. What was nice was they had it plowed 6 miles of road of the west rim, past discovery point.  The didn’t allow cars, only hikers. So with huge snow banks on each side we got to walk to several scenic overlooks of the crater. It’s not just the crater but the surrounding mountains that really make it something special. We could even see Mt Shasta from there. Bikes really would have been the way to go but we had both of ours stolen in different parts of California over the past year unfortunately, cable cut and all. Homelessness and bike theft is a huge problem in all of California and meth is a serious problem in Modesto.  Bikes are like candy to them.

Crater Lake was formed when a volcano, the highest in Oregon at the time, exploded several thousand feet of it’s top off. The little island called Wizard island in the lake was formed later from much more subdued volcanic activity. The water is purportedly the cleanest and clearest in the world with 140 ft of visibility, that would be nice for diving. This is because the only water added to the lake is from each years snow melt. There are no rivers running into the lake. The lake maintains it’s level by seepage out of the mountain. This also happens to be one of the snowiest areas in the world, receiving 12 or 13 ft of snow a year regularly.

We went ahead and purchased an America The Beautiful Pass for $80 rather than pay the $25 to get into a mostly closed park. This pass allows you to enter pretty much any national land for free for a year including national parks, national forests, national monuments, etc. You also receive half price camping at certain nationally owned parks (which we happened to use at our next spot). For anyone who visits any national owned land regularly it’s a great value.

Zygi and Mama

Next spot, camping in the middle of nowhere southwest of Bend on a stunning boondocking spot.

  • Author: Tim
  • Editor: Victoria
  • Photographer: Victoria