Somewhere Between Juntura and Vale....

We managed to pull out of Bend at about 3:00 on Monday. Food purchased at Costco, not put away however, just stacked in the RV, clothes packed….younguns refused to travel Naked….imagine that!?!

It never ceases to amaze me how geographically diverse the state of Oregon is. If we take in to account my travels on Sunday, within 24 hours, I drove from a coastal setting, through a temperate rain forest, through grass lands, over four (maybe five…Coastal Range, Cascade Range, Stinking Water Pass, Drinking Water Pass, and Stinking Water Pass, unnamed pass between Juntura and Vale ) mountain passes, through a high desert, and a high plateau.


As we were passing table top rocks out of Burns, we were discussing Native Americans and how hard it would have been to survive in such a climate. Dusty let me know that those cliffs would have been perfect for Indians. (He is a glass half full person.) I was listing the reasons why it would be incredibly hard to survive amongst the sage brush with now water, and he stopped me…

Native Americans ran buffalo off cliffs like that! Those were “perfect” cliffs! Not too tall, but tall enough to do deadly damage to the buffalo, but not to wide either, so it wouldn’t take the Native Americans all day to get to the bottom to work on the dead buffalo. Also, according to Dusty, Native Americans used all parts of the animal, including the teeth and bones, but other animals (got ya…you thought it was going to be Caucasians) like chipmunks and squirrels tend to leave the bones and teeth alone!

The child was a fountain of buffalo, and Native American information! I inquired as to where he had gotten all this knowledge, and he said with a shrug “Mrs. Jordan.” Thank you, Mrs. Jordan! You see, he was paying attention. 

Now, does anyone know if there were herds of buffalo in Eastern Oregon?

Between Bend and Ontario is desolate. We didn’t see much traffic, in fact, the entire 310 miles; we didn’t see more than 20 semi trucks!! Perhaps gas prices are slowing traffic! (This is good because I am a bit out of practice driving the RV, so the more I have the road to myself, the better!!)


Somewhere between Juntura and Vale, driving an incredibly straight highway for miles and miles and miles, and seeing sage brush and grasses, but not much else, I had an overwhelming urge to turn the RV around and head for home. (This must have been when the fatigue started setting in!!) If I was bored in Eastern Oregon…how the heck will I get across Kansas????? Oh, that’s why we are NOT going through Kansas…I just hope the Albuquerque – Amarillo – Oklahoma City leg has something to look at!

The plan was to stop in Meridian at a water park and then try to make Salt Lake City tonight, but the weather gods are not paying attention! (Or messing with us!) It is overcast, and windy in Fruitland, and the weather forecast in Meridian is not much better! So, we will push on down 84 and see if we can make Salt Lake City today.

I am off to make coffee, and feed the mantids!