Central Oregon

I planned a road trip for Oregon.  Sadie and Kaden wanted to go but Kylee and Dylan did not.  So we left them behind and we hit the road.

I love Oregon and there is a lot to see.  Highest on the list was the Samuel H Boardman State Scenic Corridor.  This is a stretch of coast on the south end of Oregon with some amazing places to stop.  But equally as cool was a highway full of waterfalls called Rogue-Umpqua Scenic Byway, aka Oregon's Highway of Waterfalls.  This was from Crater Lake heading West so I planned a stop at Crater Lake.  I also came across a small little hideaway close to there with the most beautiful water I've ever seen so we packed the paddleboards too.

Leading up to the trip, Oregon was on fire.  As it got closer, I had to research which roads were closed due to fires to make sure we didn't end up stuck with no access.  Turns out the road was open where we needed, but ALL the stops off the road were closed due to the fire.  Meaning ALL the waterfall stops and a hot springs we wanted to see were closed.  I was SO BUMMED!!  What a waste.  Who knows if we will make it that way again.  But we went anyway.

We started the drive and stayed near Boise the first night, then drove to Klamath Falls and stayed at a resort right on the large Upper Klamath Lake.  The place was called Running Y Resort and it was really nice!  The kids always like to swim.  But we also played tennis and had a nice meal.  Ryan and I went for a sunset walk and the smoky sky made the sunset cool

There's a golf course with the resort and they had a little mini golf course we decided to play.  It was SO cool!  Not your average mini golf course.  Ryan and Kaden loved it.

We left there and headed towards Crater Lake.  But first we stopped at the little water area I had found.  It's called Jackson F Kimball State Recreation Site (Wood River).  We basically had the place to ourselves.  It was gorgeous.  The prettiest water I've seen, but also the coldest.  It was a warm day but the water was still icy cold.  It's a small area.  There are connecting streams and such but they don't have the pretty turquoise color and they aren't as calm so we didn't venture too far.  

From there we headed up to Crater Lake National Park.  It's a cool place with awesome views.  I think it would be a little cooler if it weren't smoky but that's okay.  It's a windy climb to get to the top of the crater.  We drove around it and hiked a trail that took us down to the water, which was also really cold.  It's a really deep lake!  So the blue of the water starts off pretty at the edge and gets dark fast.

Sadie cracked me up with her little bag stuffed full of anything you might need.  Hand sanitizer? Sunscreen? Chapstick? Lotion?  She was prepared.

We spent the night in the closest town called Chiloquin and when we woke up, the air was horrible.  It was visibly super smoky right on top of us.  I was like, get us out of here!! We were heading West to the green part of this map.

As we were driving, we didn't see anything actually burning.  But we saw these little camps set up for the firefighters.  And we saw lots of smoky air.