Before I start, I wanted to say thanks for those that commented. I am not sure of the protocol and if I’m supposed to comment back publicly, but thank you for reading and enjoying.

As I said to Linda about 4 years ago, I need to find my wanderlust, and besides asking how much money it would cost, she has been totally onboard with the journey. My parents were nomadic and I remember moving from NY / NJ to California a number of times. Then, once I got my drivers license, I was gone.

OK – here’s a funny coincidence – I chatted with Dennis (of Dennis and Anastasia) last month and told him of my plans to visit the Susanville area and he said since I’m up there, I should go to a hot springs in the desert that was really special. So I did. Made a reservation at the Surprise Valley Mineral Wells. It’s a collection of rooms, all with hot tubs.

Turns out, Surprise Valley is 6 miles east of Cedarville, right by the Nevada border, and is the ‘staycation’ destination for Robin and Randy!

Each room has its own hot tub and control for temp. At night, the stargazing was pretty dang nice. The rooms were very nice with full kitchens and living rooms, which is important if you are up here for a few days, you need to fend for yourself. No resort services beyond a room. As an FYI, all rooms are heated by the hot springs, which in the winter is great since this place is busy year round. And, the well water that comes from here is really tasty.

The upper desert has had an abundance of rain this year, which is greening up everything and quite spectacular.

And, since rainfall is typically much less, it doesn’t take much to fill a dry lake bed. This might only be 6″ deep at the deep end!

You folks do know I love taking pictures of my bus, right!?

Think of it as reference for size. In my early commercial photo days, we used to shoot lots of little parts and connectors for an electronics client’s catalogs. For reference in the photos, the clients would have us put a pack of Marlboro cigs in the shot, so you could gauge size! The red box only (maybe they were using if for color matching as well).

This trip is also for a bit of recon as we’ll be leaving the bus in Portland. I have never been familiar with the country around Bend and the Sisters area, but would like to know more and ultimately fish it on a return trip with Linda in the not too distant future.

Thought this was interesting way up here!

Many of the lakes in the upper desert are alkaline, shallow and when they recede, they create new pasture land.

The road to Bend involved climbing out of the upper desert and back into the mountains.

Side Bar: throughout the mountains, up and down from San Francisco, over Donner and the Sierra’s and Cascades, I had to downshift into 3rd gear toward the tops, but my hill climbing speed never dropped below 40 MPH, and that was pretty cool.

Here’s a shot of the Sisters mountains outside of Bend – and not my shot 😉

Found a great campground near the Sisters in the Camp Sherman area.

Just past the fence line is the Metolius River, which is a fly fishing only river. A fellow I met mentioned it is an expert level stream, so my skills might not translate. However, I’d like to fish the Deschutes River on my next trip with a guide, and in a boat. In Oregon, I believe you cannot fish out of a boat on a river like you can in Montana, which is fine with me as I prefer to work a stream from standing in the stream or on the shoreline.

At dusk, the campground was very picturesque and worthy of another shot of my bus 👍

Salem, Oregon

Needed to take a day to write and clean up for putting the Westy away in Portland tomorrow, so I got a spot in the Premier RV Campground outside of Salem. Linda and I stayed in one of these ‘Premier RV’ campgrounds in Oregon a couple years ago and they certainly serve their purpose. Most RV campground bathrooms are pretty sketchy, but this place was like the Taj! Those are all showers on the left and there were an equal number of shitters on the other side! And, I never saw more than one person in the bathroom at any time, so I liked the chances of getting a clean stall 😳

And, just like many of the RV campgrounds I’ve visited, there were a number of folks living for extended periods in these parks. Chatted up a fellow named Tom, who is an Engineer and is living full time in this park with his wife, who works for the State of Oregon. Seems they sold their house and did not have the new one purchased so they had to buy a 5th wheel trailer and move in here until they find a new home. At that time, they will sell the 5th wheel. We discussed the opportunity of putting the 5th wheel on their new property and using it for Airbnb. Linda and I saw so many of these during our travels and believe it will continue to be a trend.

It’s time to pack it in on Saturday afternoon and catch a flight home. But before that, I did manage to clean up my baby for another day, secured a storage facility near the airport in Portland that is inside, and found a reputable air cooled VW shop as well. My Westy will be due for a valve adjustment and oil change before we head out for more road trippin.

Leave you with two items…

…first a great shot of Mount Hood while flying out of Portland…

…and second, a final comment on this trip.

I cannot begin to tell you how much fun this week was. While I wanted to have Linda with me to meet Rob, Marsha and Robin and Randy, she was on her annual Disney trip with Kenzie, our grandaughter, and her sister, Jane and Jane’s daughter, Biza. They have made this annual trip for about 15 or so years and I certainly can’t get in the way!

That said, this trip was really satisfying to finally bookend a 45 year absence of enjoying the company of people that were important in my life.

More to come, hopefully soon.