HOWDY Y'ALL!
I don't know about you, but I know for myself that I had an incredible weekend!!!!
This post is mostly gonna be photos because they speak a million more stories then I could write.
Brief synapsis of what the rest of my week looked like... I pretty much busted butt all week and took off to Eastern Oregon Thursday night with my good friend Cyndi. Fun fact about Cyndi: she was a professional body builder for several years and holds numerous gold and silver medals from competitive power lifting. Sooo, she's pretty much a badass. 😎 Her and I have been friends for about four years, we used to train together at the gym, and then we built a pretty tight bond with one another.
Night number one we drove out to Joseph, OR and camped at Wallowa Lake. As you can see, it was SNOWING! We weren't really anticipating the snow, but I went well prepared so despite it being a bit colder than anticipated, we were alright.
As you can see the lake is gorgeous and I was thrilled we went this time of the year where the trees are changing colors.
Then we stopped at Chief Joseph's gravesite. For those of you who don't know who Chief Joseph was.. He was the leader of the Wal-lam-wat-kain band of the Nez Perce tribe. He lead his people during the time that they were forcibly removed from the Wallowa valley, onto reservations in Idaho.
If you're interested in history or Native American studies I suggest reading Thunder in the Mountains: Chief Joseph, Oliver Otis Howard, and the Nez Perce War by Daniel Sharfstein. If I remember correctly it took Sharfstein about twenty years of researching to construct this beautifully written story about the mechanics of American power, and the limits of what the government can and should do for its people. (A topic that is still very relevant today)
This was really special to me, as a Native man to pay respects to a respected ancestor and elder. I have many friends who are Nez Perce and it has been important to me as an Oregonian to learn the history of the land I inhabit and the people who lived here originally.
Then we headed back towards La Grande, where we paid a visit to Hot Lake Hot Springs! This place has been on my bucket list for a while, so I was thrilled we got to stop for a relaxing and rejuvenating soak.
Oregon has hot springs throughout the state, due to all the mountain ranges we have. One of my favorite things in the whole world is going to hot springs.. there is nothing more relaxing then being in nutrient rich waters that detox and cleanse your body.
Found an awesome Antique shop that is totally volunteer run by the locals and the money from items purchased goes right back into the community to fund different things like the library and activities for kids and seniors. Cyndi found an awesome coffee cup that says "Nasty Woman".. LOVE IT.
We kept driving until we saw this old dilapidated cement factory from the freeway. We quickly took the exit and found our way up to this artistic oasis.
We roamed around the grounds, which clearly said NO TRESSPASSING.. we decided it was worth breaking the rules. SO WORTH IT.
There were a number of brick blocks that were painted of different designer purses.. Chanel, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Givenchy..etc. We thought that was really creative and fun.
Then we drove into the night, ended up briefly in Idaho, where I stopped to visit a friend.. We drove back across the border into Oregon and drove for over an hour on a gravel road, in the pitch black, oh and by the way it was POURING DOWN SNOW!!! hahahaha. We were cracking up the whole way there because it was so freaky and awesome. At one point we were turning around a corner and then all of the sudden it looked like we saw a bunch of lights, only to realize they were COW EYES!!
Here is our tent, you can't see anything else because it was totally black outside. The view was phenomenal.. I could clearly see the Milky Way.. Oh also it was 26 degrees outside.... BRRRRR!
This is Leslie Gulch during the daytime. It is dubbed Oregon's Grand Canyon. It was stunningly beautiful and luckily for us the sun was shining so even though it was 32 degrees most of the morning, the sun helped keep us a bit warmer.
We hiked around the canyons for a while and got a ton of awesome pictures.
Video clip of us driving in the night, through the snow... It's dark and really crappy quality but... it is also really funny.
Us standing on the boarder of Oregon and Idaho... if you look closely you can see all the gunshot holes in the sign.. (this is one of my favorite features of rural areas... the signs ALWAYS have gunshot holes)
I don't know about you, but I know for myself that I had an incredible weekend!!!!
This post is mostly gonna be photos because they speak a million more stories then I could write.
Brief synapsis of what the rest of my week looked like... I pretty much busted butt all week and took off to Eastern Oregon Thursday night with my good friend Cyndi. Fun fact about Cyndi: she was a professional body builder for several years and holds numerous gold and silver medals from competitive power lifting. Sooo, she's pretty much a badass. 😎 Her and I have been friends for about four years, we used to train together at the gym, and then we built a pretty tight bond with one another.
This was really special to me, as a Native man to pay respects to a respected ancestor and elder. I have many friends who are Nez Perce and it has been important to me as an Oregonian to learn the history of the land I inhabit and the people who lived here originally.
Then we headed back towards La Grande, where we paid a visit to Hot Lake Hot Springs! This place has been on my bucket list for a while, so I was thrilled we got to stop for a relaxing and rejuvenating soak.
Did I mention I love hot springs??? We actually ended up going to two more hot springs. The picture on the top left is the private tub we rented for $10. This was in Crane, Oregon aka THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE. The one on the right is the "Russian Bathes", a 'secret' spot of mine where you hike out about a mile right off the Breitenbush river. I love going to this one cuz it's about 1.5hrs from my house and if you go at the right time no one else is there. We hiked in the dark Saturday night and snuck in a nice soak before heading back to Portland.
The bottom photo is the outdoor soaking pool at Crystal Crane hot springs. Once again, SUPER DREAMY.
All in all, we drove wayyyy over 1000 miles. We trekked across Oregon and pretty much did a big loop. We saw so many amazing sights, and the perks of driving in the middle of nowhere is there is no traffic,, so I took advantage of that and drove like the speed demon I wish I could be. Too bad the traffic is really crappy in Portland.. I now know to drive out to eastern Oregon to get my fill.
The moral of the story is, Oregon is awesome. I can say that I live in one of the most beautiful states in the US. Annnnd I have amazing friends that like to give me the best birthday presents EVER. So if you decide to visit Oregon, do keep in mind, Portland is cool (I guess), but the rest of Oregon is way more interesting. ALSO -- if you are a rockhound like I am, there is so many sweet places to find all kinds of cool rocks. [I collect rocks... my room is littered with rocks all over the place]
If you have any questions about any of the places I visited or anything else, please feel free to hit me up!
Cheers!
Lukas
lukasmsoto@lclark.edu