Mt Bachelor

We did the Cascade Lakes Scenic Byway up to Mt Bachelor and Elk Lake Resort yesterday.  My son Tod and his wife Char are here for a week so we're showing them a few of the local sights.  That's them below, at Elk Lake Resort

We took the chair lift up to the restaurant on Mt Bachelor, had lunch there.

Below, the 3 Sisters and Broken Top, taken from the restaurant balcony.

Closeup

 of the 3 Sisters, below. 

Closeup of Broken Top.

Balloons Over Bend

The 3-day Bend balloon festival started this morning, and it so happens that it started at an elementary school right across the street from our RV campground.

We walked over to see the early AM launch.  Trish was a few minutes ahead of me, wasn't aware I took pix of her and Artie.

Pilot Butte, Part 2

This bronze thing helps viewers identify prominent geographical features, both near and far.  It's located in the middle of the viewing area on top of the Butte.

If you're a frequent reader of this blog, you know I like to research name origins and include my findings here.  However, my previous post on Pilot Butte's name origin was not researched.  In fact, it's pure fiction.  I opted to create a credible name origin history, then see if it came close to the real thing.  It did not.

The Butte was actually named in 1851 by the leader of the first wagon train to stop here.  I assume the pilot connection was referencing its use as the landmark near a good place to ford the Deschutes River.

The Cascade Cycling Classic was held here last week.  The guys above are part of an 8-man team that rode their bikes to the top of Pilot Butte between races just for the heck of it.  It's a steep road to the top; I darn sure wouldn't have made it.  Not sure which mountain is in the background, Jefferson perhaps.

As cinder cones go, Pilot Butte is unremarkable - not very high, not very conical.  It's within the Bend city limits, 1 of 4 US cities with volcanoes; the others are Portland, OR; Jackson, MS; and Twentynine Palms, CA.

Pilot Butte

In the early days of aviation, pilots in open-cockpit, bi-wing planes had to wing it (nyuk, nyuk) on navigation.  There were no radios.  No control towers.  No radar.  No GPS.  The maps weren't all that great, either.  And, unfolding a map in an open cockpit was challenging at best.  Navigation was by compass and visual landmarks.

Pilot Butte was the landmark pilots zeroed in on when they were flying into Bend, OR.  There was a windsock on a tall wooden pole atop the Butte to assist pilots when they landed in a nearby meadow that had been cleared of debris.

The Butte is a 500' cinder cone in Bend, OR, with a road and hiking trails up to the top.  Great views from the top, many snow capped mountains in sight, including Mt Adams, 150 miles away.  The City does its July 4th fireworks display there; above picture shows it being set up.

Bend Summerfest

Better than your average summerfest/street fair, with several blocks of vendor tents, 3 music stages, perfect weather.  We scanned all the tents, tried to find a cool cowgirl hat for Trish but they were all too big.  She bought a colorful little bead bracelet.

This guy apparently liked to feed ducks and spent all his money doing so; that's an empty wallet in his hands.  Didn't get his name, not a great talker, assume he was a real person in a former life.

Below, cool bird sculpture along ceiling of passageway between 2 downtown streets.

We were gonna have lunch near one of the sound stages but the only one active at the time was playing jazz.  I don't do jazz but did enjoy some Dave Brubeck stuff back in the day.  Jazz isn't dead last in my musical preferences, a dubious honor permanently held by classic opera; can't stand it, worse than fingernails on a chalkboard.  

I attended a rock opera in Alexandria, Egypt in the early 80s, loved it!  It was done by a European touring group, German I think.  Do you know the difference between a rock opera and a musical?  I didn't, just now looked it up: a musical has dialogue in addition to the singing; rock opera is singing only.

We chose the Pine Tavern (in business since 1936) for lunch, sat on the patio overlooking Mirror Pond on the Deschutes River.  Very pleasant.

Newberry National Volcano Monument

Lava Butte is a 500' cinder cone located a few miles south of Bend.  The lookout shack is manned only in the summer and only during daylight hours.  About 125 fires, mostly from lightning strikes, are spotted each year.

In the early 60s astronauts trained here because NASA thought the rough lava flow surfaces were similar to the surface of the moon.  Wrong!  But, no harm, no foul.  The astronauts did get to see interesting geological features they probably didn't even know existed.

The Monument has several notable features, including cinder cones, caves, 2 caldera lakes, lava and obsidian flows.  It's located in the Deschutes National Forest, south of Bend, and is the largest volcano in the Cascade Range.

A viewpoint on the Newberry Volcano road, snow capped mountains: Bachelor, the Three Sisters, and Broken Top.

Paulina Lake, the largest of the 2 caldera lakes.

A series of steep steps leads to the obsidian flow area.

A closeup of obsidian, which is actually volcanic glass, colored with minerals.  Beautiful stuff!  The monument has thousands of obsidian chunks.  Natives used it to make tools, knives, arrowheads.

Aerial view showing part of the caldera, Paulina and East Lakes.

Petersen Rock Garden

A couple days ago, we had some time to kill in Redmond, OR while having some warranty work done on the RV.  Our most interesting adventure of the day was the Petersen Rock Garden, a few miles south of town.

Petersen was a farmer who loved rocks, spent 17 years collecting rocks and building the various structures pictured here.  Included are creative versions of the US Capitol building (with peacock), statue of liberty and Independence Hall.

The engraved stone below says 'enjoy yourself, it's later than you think.'

Lots of peacocks and assorted breeds of chickens wander around the grounds.  This one chicken, black and white speckled fellow, very much wanted to be my friend, followed me around awhile, finally decided I wasn't up for a relationship with his (her?) kind of chick, and went back to doing whatever it was doing.

There's also a small museum with lots of rocks, some pictures and historical stuff about Petersen, who died in 1952.