Road Trip ~ Day 5

I was awake by 6am. I could hear the ranchers in the field behind the house, the cattle moving from the barn and the birds chirping. What a wonderful way to wake up. I read for a little while before I heard the B&B's owner, Nancy, come in to the house to get breakfast started. Once I smelled the coffee brewing, I headed for the kitchen.

Phil, Nancy's husband, and head rancher at Wilson Ranches Retreat was scrambling eggs when I walked in. A very large fry pan full of eggs.

"I hear you're the one driving the glove box out there." he says

"Yes, that would be me." I smile, wondering if he was going to allow me to have coffee. He looked serious about making eggs.

"Well, Nancy loves it!" he says "And we just bought a new Avalanche, so I told her we don't need one of those little things too."

By now, he was smiling so I felt safe pouring myself coffee. I joined a few others in the dinning room. We all talked while waiting for breakfast.

Breakfast is served at 8am. Not 7:45am or 8:15am, but 8:00am. And, you'd better be sitting at the table when breakfast comes out. Phil is serious about his schedule. The ranch doesn't run on it's own you know?

I made sure that Makena was up and at the table by 8:00. Makena isn't really a "morning person" and breakfast with 18 other people didn't really impress her either. But, we were both full of home made oatmeal, eggs, peaches, blueberry muffins and OJ very quickly. And then we were happy; listening to the stories of the ranch.

We (maybe just me) hoped to go horseback riding that morning, but there was a wedding in town so Nancy wasn't able to take anyone until later that afternoon. Makena and I decided to go for one last walk before heading out. Nancy told us about a trail that we could hike that would take us up above the ranch. All Makena heard was "up".

And after 5 minutes of walking "up"hill...she was done hiking.

I do have to admit that it's a little difficult to enjoy the scenery when you have to watch the ground for rattle snakes. I did sneak in a few pictures before heading back to the car.

Then we were back on the road. We decided to do a little backtracking and visit the final John Day Fossil Beds - Painted Hills Unit. The only road there from the ranch took us through three towns; one of which we actually saw. Towns with 20 people or less tend not to have a lot of buildings or stop signs. The road was windy, but the scenery was gorgeous.

Along the way, I noticed a furry little object in the road. I stopped, reversed, and found this baby bird standing in the middle of the road. Apparently momma bird wasn't happy with baby or us; she jumped around flapping her wings and chirping. We just went on our way...hoping all was well for baby bird.

Most of the trails to the Painted Hills were one to two mile long, gravel roads. Doug was very dirty.

But the hills were beautiful.

Makena was happy that the trails were mostly level and some were even paved.

Because this detour took us a little father South than I had planned, we stopped for lunch at Black Bear Diner in Madras.

Then we reconnected with our route and stopped in Shaniko. We heard that there was an old fashioned ice cream parlor there and that's all Makena cared about. I just wanted to see the old buildings. I could have spent all day there, but as you can see, there was a storm moving in.

After Shaniko, we were headed home. I had a great time, and hope Makena did too. It's her turn to choose the destination next year, so who knows where we'll end up next?!? We ended up driving 926 miles this trip. Loved.It.All.

Another nice thing about driving Doug; when you're driving a narrow, two-lane road and see something you want to photograph, you can easily and quickly turn your vehicle around.

And you don't miss the good stuff.