The Final Stretch to Yamhill County.

Saturday, 2^nd of June to Monday, 25^th of June – On to McMinnville, Oregon (with an excursion to Seattle, WA, and then the Forest Roads back to and through the Washington & Oregon Cascades).

During most of this past year, I have been surprisingly unmolested by insect pests, for the most part; the following deals with those times that I did or are now having run-ins with.  The photographs are of the journey through Oregon, from crossing the border in the Warner Mountains to Yamhill County, and then the trip back from Seattle a couple days later.

Looking back towards Mount Bidwell in California …
one of those groves is where I camped.

A mountain meadow in the Warners.

Interesting flowers …
whatever they are.

Beaver Dam & Lodge.

Insects

While setting up camp in Lodgepoles, I was soon greeted by High Desert Oregon mosquitoes!  Out came the repellent, and up went the netting on all four side windows of the truck, and thus received only a few kisses from the pesky greeting committee.  So this brings onto the subject of insects.  Throughout my travels west, I have been surprisingly untroubled by insect pests.

 

However, in the end I did not get away from southern Utah scot free from the no-see-ums, you will remember that I mentioned in my May 15^th post.  When they first began to hover around, I looked them up online, and read an extensive article about them.  The author said that they are a scourge from mid-May to mid-June, and that they always seemed to go for his ears, and also left red marks the size of a pencil eraser.  Since the ones I was spotting seemed to be just hovering about and not landing on my head or ears, I assumed that I might escape the area unmolested, but then I noticed red pencil eraser marks on my calves, which began to itch … they must have trickled up my loose trousers, when I was sitting in my camp chair painting; I never felt a bite.  I zapped the marks with my first aid cream, which helped relieve the itch for a time, and after a week to ten days the itching ceased altogether, but the pencil-eraser marks lasted for over three weeks.  I am one who does not scratch any insect bites; I rely on my hydro-cortisone cream.  Mosquito bites last for a day or two … these southern Utah gnats really take the cake.

Camas Prairie where I camped
during a snowfall in December, 2014 …
after the “great road building incident.”

Buffalo Prairie.

On the logs of a cabin
above Buffalo Prairie.

In my first camp, after l left Great Basin National Park, below the Schell Creek Mountains, I discovered a tick in a very difficult place to see, let alone remove.  I remembered that some years ago I had purchased a “tick key,” by Coleman I believe.  It works.  Even though I could have used a third hand I managed to get the little blighted off.  First tick I have seen since I was a kid in the northern Wisconsin woods … we young boys would sometimes find one wandering on our bodies, while sitting in church, of all places, and pass it around.  It was a part of Northwoods life.  Now days there are tick-borne diseases you must worry about.  I looked up on line about them and determined that I probably need not worry, but for two weeks afterwards I inspected the bite area (it had left no mark at all), and applied triple antibiotic gel from my first aid kit.  Lyme disease, although there are cases out in the West, is still primarily an eastern and Great Lakes scourge.  The longest it could have been attached, would have been 24 hours.  It probably was resident in that valley below the Schell Creek Mountains, but could have been picked up on my walk in Great Basin National Park, in which case it would have been wandering about my truck for two days … possible I suppose.

Lakeview, Oregon’s sweet little town hall.

And now back in the Pacific Northwest I have mosquitoes to contend with.  Some camps have them and some seem to be mosquito free.  They aren't as voracious as Minnesota mosquitoes (reminiscent of Cobra Gunships), or the legendary Alaskan denizens (similar to B-52s, I am reliably informed), but they do have their moments in some camps.  All three nights, in two different camps in the Warner Mountains, had them, but the next two nights, across the valley north of Lakeview, Oregon, were mosquito free; enough about insects.  I was in that camp while I awaited my appointment to have my front brake pads replaced. 

But enough about insect pests … after camping in the Lodgepoles for two nights, my next camp was west of Drake Peak, in the northern Warners, near Buffalo Prairie.  While looking for a campsite, and driving along the north rim of the Prairie, I spotted a doe in silhouette at the bottom end of the screen of trees between the road and the open ground.  I stopped to get a photo or three, when it dashed off a few yards.  I thought she had finally decided I was a threat, even though my car was a hundred yards distant, and then in front of her I glimpsed a flash of brown, which I took to be a second deer, until it kept up into a tree!  The doe returned to where I had first seen it.  By and by the beast in the tree dropped to the ground and dashed away to the west.  The total time it had been in my sight was a maximum of two seconds … not a lot of time for an identification.  I racked my brains as to what I had glimpsed, and settled on a Fisher.  These are almost the same as Pine Martens, but a bit larger and huskier.  The doe, I believe, might have been protecting a fawn; this I surmised by its actions, for the possible fawn remained hidden.  I stopped into the Ranger Station at Lakeview a few days later, to enquire as to what it might have been that I spotted.  There are rumors of Fishers, in the Warner Mountains, and further west there was Fisher DNA in the contents of an autopsied Coyote’s stomach, but that was it.  Talking it over, we eliminated everything else, and left it open between a Marten of a Fisher.  Later I dug out my mammals book, and now I definitely lean heavily towards the Fisher.

The protective doe.

Brake pads replaced, I made my way north on Hwy 131 from Lakeview, the “tallest town in Oregon (meaning the highest altitude, at 4800 feet),” to Paisley.  Here I climbed up into the mountains west of town, on the forest roads, towards Winter Ridge, and found a campsite just off the Slide Mountain Road, two thirds of the way up at the south end of the Ridge.  That evening and the next morning were first class, although the wind picked up in the afternoon as I made my way along Winter Ridge, to Fremont Point.  Here, at 3000' above Summer Lake below, I took photos, and then proceeded north on a forest road.  Back in 2010, and at the same time of year, this road had been impassable, and it almost was this time, but at two miles in, it improved, and there were two campsites, each with picnic tables.  Here I stopped for the night and managed to prepare supper, in spite of the wind.  A possibility of rain was in the forecast, and so there was … a light drizzle overnight, which turned to snow as I finished breakfast and headed out … and this on June 9^th!  Well I was at 7000' here.  I found huge trees downed another mile along; Winter deadfalls. So I turned around and made my way the three miles back to Fremont Point, needing 4-wheel drive now in a couple of muddy spots.  Once on the main forest roads the going was OK, and so I enjoyed a taste of Winter … on Winter Ridge … in June!!!  A couple of inches fell as I drove along, and it gradually petered out as I descended west towards Thomas Lake, 15 miles away and a couple thousand feet below.  I asked people camping there if they had had any flurries, but only a bit of rain had fallen there.

Wildflower hillside on the way up to Winter Ridge.

Summer Lake from the South,
with Winter Ridge all the way along its western side …
Winter Ridge is 3000’ above the lake.

A lake while ascending Winter Ridge.

Buttercups on Winter Ridge.

Summer Lake from Fremont Point. 
It was Fremont who gave the
Ridge & Lake their names.

My campsite the evening before …

… the June 9^th snowfall!

(To be continued ...

Cutting my way into Oregon.

Friday, 1^st of June to Saturday, 2^nd June, 2018; 

Big Den Creek, Nevada to the Warner Mountains, Oregon.

Sand Mountain.

Once the Pony Express ran by here …
now ATVs sputter about.

Upon leaving Big Den Creek, I crossed over or passed around several more mountain ranges, and the down into the Salt Wells Basin to Fallon, NV, re-supplied, crossed over the Carson River and the edge of Carson Sink.  This fairly dismal landscape, seems to form a frontier between many of the plant communities I had become used to over the past months, and those of the High Desert and the Basin & Range section of the Pacific Northwest, for when I camped that night, half a mile off of Hwy 477 and northwest of the Black Rock Desert (think Burning Man Festival), I was surrounded by Junipers only … no Pinyons … and certainly no Snakeweed.  It was beginning to feel like southeastern Oregon still close to a hundred miles off.  From Fallon I had passed through Fernley, crossed over Interstate 80, picked up State Hwy 477, passed by Pyramid Lake, spotted wild burros north of mostly dry Winnemucca Lake, in the Poito Valley, gazed up the flat expanse of the Black Rock Desert as I crossed over its southern tip at Gerlach, NV, to my campsite for the night near Squaw Summit.  The next day would see me back into Oregon, but not without incident.

Pyramid Lake … for obvious reasons.

Lake Winemucca … mostly dry.

Wild …

… Burros.

There did not seem to be any Snakeweed in the area, so somewhere while crossing Nevada, I must have passed out of the zone in which that plant thrives.  Snakeweed is one of those plants I became familiar with, during my months spent on the Colorado Plateau.  The Native Americans would use bundles of it to brush the prickles off the Prickly Pear Cacti, during food preparation; so much to learn about the plants and animals in the world around us!

Last Camp in Nevada
… no Pinyons … no Snakeweed.

June 2^nd and twenty or thirty miles after crossing over Squaw Summit, Hwy 477 descends down into Surprise Valley, and passing from Nevada into the extreme northeastern California.  The Warner Mountains had been visible all the way from the Summit, and now formed the western wall of Surprise Valley.  The eastern side of this long valley is still the high desert terrain, I had been passing through, and in the Valley are three long alkali lakes, dry for the most part, but with stretches of water.  However, the western side of the Valley, between the alkali lakes and Warners, is lush and green, especially at this time of year, and dotted with farms and ranches, and some of the largest and most magnificent Cottonwoods I have ever seen.  There are pools, and ponds, and marshes, and green pastures; such a contrast with the lands I had passed through, beyond the alkali lakes.  And, yes, Surprise Valley is a surprise, just as it was for some early pioneers heading along the southern route to Oregon, some of whom turned around, once they got to Oregon, and came back to settle.

First view of the Warner Mountains
from Squaw Summit on Hwy 477.

Looking up Surprise Valley from the South.

Down the Surprise Valley
from Fort Bidwell.

Cedarville is the largest of three small towns in the Valley, with a population of about four or five hundred.  From here the main road turns west and crosses over the Warner Mountains, to US Hwy 395 and Alturas California. From there it is north along the shores of Goose Lake to the Oregon border and Lakeview, a few miles further on.  I did not go that way, but took the roads less travelled.  Heading north from Cedarville, I passed through Fort Bidwell, with no shops still in business that I could see.  From here the choice is northeast, on the lower desert/forest roads to the “wide spot in the road,” Adel, on Hwy 140, or north on County Road 2 into the Warner Mountains, and the latter is what I took.

Climbing high out of Fort Bidwell …

… and higher still …

… and even higher into the Warners.

Indian Paintbrush.

Unknown white flower.

Climbing and climbing, up and up for ten miles, and from 4000’ to 8000’, brought me to the crest of the Warners; I could have stayed on County Road 2 down to Hwy 395 and Goose Lake, but I turned northeast onto a small forest road (148, I think), and began my descent towards the Oregon border that way.  Squeezing past several trees that had fallen onto the road during the Winter, finally brought me to a pair of trees that had fallen all the way across the roadway.  ATV drivers had already been through, but had only cut a path through wide enough for their little machines.  I lifted the tops of the trees off the road, but because of the small stream on that side, was still unable to pass; time to give my Christmas axe a workout!  I worked through the branches of both trees, clearing the way to safely get a swing at the main trunks of the fallen.  My Christmas axe ... a hand-forged, Scandinavian Forest Axe, cut beautifully; thank you siblings.

Moonlight Mine, just as I started down towards Oregon, from the highpoint.

Half a mile along brought me out onto high mountain meadows.  The road became more rutted and very rocky, and I began to think of turning around … there could be twenty miles of this!  But as I crested a ridge I could see mountains in the distance that I recognized thirty or forty miles away, and in Oregon; Hart Mountain on the right to the east, and Drake Peak in the Warner Mountains on the left to the west, with the Warner Valley in between.

Out of the woods with
Mount Bidwell behind me.

Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge
in the distance to the northeast …

  … & Drake Peak to the west
of the Warner Valley.

Some sort of yellow flowers.

I saw a cattle grid a couple hundred yards away, and I decided to make my decision to turn around or not, once I got there.  The border was closer than I thought, for once at the grid, a sign on the other side said “Welcome to the Fremont National Forest.”  That's Oregon, I thought, since I was in California's Modoc National Forest.  I crossed over into Oregon, eleven months after departing the Twin Cities.  Two miles farther on, I camped within a grove of large trees that from a distance I had taken to be Ponderosas, due to their size; they turned out to be enormous and magnificent Lodgepole Pines; I've never seen Lodgepoles so big.  I had said to the Ranger at the Great Basin National Park Visitors Center, that I would spend about ten days crossing Nevada … it took me seventeen … I was in a bit of a hurry, or it might have taken even longer.

Standing in California
looking at my truck in Oregon … made it!

First camp in Oregon,
amongst the large Lodgepoles.

Pretty Blue Flowers hereabouts.

These little blossoms were tucked in
under the leaves, and only accidentally 
spotted they were under there.

Garnets, Hickison Petroglyphs and Big Den Creek.

Monday, 21^st May to Thursday, the 31^st May, 2018; 
from Ely, to Big Den Creek, Nevada.

C1672

“Late Afternoon Light on the Canyon Walls”

(Big Den Creek, Nevada)

Oil Study on Pannelli Telati fine Cotton Panel

5” x 7”

Click here to make this Your Own

Pigments used in the painting:

Imprimatura: Rublev Ercolano Red;

Drawing: W&N Cobalt & Ultramarine Deep Blues;

Pigments: W&N Cerulean, Cobalt and Ultramarine Deep Blues, Cadmiums Orange & Yellow Pale;

Rublev: Ercolano Red, Purple Ochre, Blue Ridge Yellow Ochre, Italian Burnt Sienna, Orange Molybdate & Lead White #2.

(Take Note: for those receiving an email notification, click on the title of the latest blog posting at the top of the post, in the email, (not the title of the painting itself); this will open up the actual blog itself, and you may then enjoy the paintings at their best.)

West of Ely, about five or six miles, there is a rock hounding site called Garnet Hill, about three miles up a gravel road.  I went to see what it was all about, and spent an hour turning over rocks looking for garnets. I did find several small crystals embedded in the rhyolite rocks, and of no great quality, but I had fulfilled what I had wanted to do … to find an example or two within the base rock, as a souvenir. I think a fun day of it could be had here with a shovel, hammer and chisel, and probably a few decent garnets might be found.  By the end of my hour on Garnet Hill, I had got my eye in, so what would a whole day be like?

Another thirty miles down the road, I turned south onto the Hamilton Road, another gravel road, leading to the ghost town of Hamilton, ten miles in.  I had no intention of going to Hamilton … I was just looking for a decent campsite.  I found several, but deemed them too muddy, and after I crossed over the pass, I found myself on the west slopes of the Mokomoke Mountains, part of the White Pine Range.  And here things got hairy, as the road was quite slick with clay, and even in 4-wheel drive, the truck would fish-tail, I drove extremely slowly, with a dry mouth and throat, as I have experienced lack of control sliding down an incline on clay.  But extreme slowness was the key in this case.

So? … What? … I like flowers.

Derelict building
in the ghost town of Hamilton.

As stated I found myself on the side of the mountain, and as there was no good places to camp, I found myself in Hamilton, or what's left of it … there are a scattering of stone building, most fallen in, some collapsed wooden structures, and one modern sheet metal barn, by the look of it.  It was late, so I didn't hang around in Hamilton, but found a lower road, not so muddy or slick with clay.  It turns out I was on the Lincoln Highway, which was the first automobile road across the entire USA, from New York to San Francisco, conceived in 1912 and dedicated in 1913; I remember seeing a documentary, with Model Tees chugging along a dirt road … much like I was doing there on the Hamilton road.    I drove very carefully … just in case.  Four or five miles on I found a good campsite, which turned out not to be muddy, thankfully.

Lincoln Highway.

A mixed flock of birds flew through my camp, the next morning, which included a Western Tanager, a pair of Mountain Bluebirds, a several Cassins Finches (both male and female), a Rufous-sided Towhee, and a male Mountain Chickadee.  The Cassins Finches were a first for me.  I decided to spend the day here, and let the intermittent showers pass through, and head out the next morning.  I would paint, and keep my eye out for birdlife.  A few yards from camp, I found a butterfly that blended into the earth it was sitting on.  Just then the Sun went in, and the butterfly folded its wings.  I watched as the Sun reappeared, and shortly, the wings unfolded, soaking up the Sun's rays, warming enough to fly, but not before I got a couple of photos.

Sadly, my butterfly book is packed away.

For a desert state,
sure has a lot of showers floating about …

… but it brings out the flowers
at this time of year.

Although tempted to stay longer, at this excellent camp, I headed out after my second night.  Stopping in the town of Eureka (much smaller than Ely), I failed to make a blog posting, since the local library, although connected to the Internet through their own computers, did not have Wi-Fi!  The library did, however, have a water pump outside, which allowed my water bottles to be filled.  Thus stymied the westward “Loneliest road in America” beckoned.  Hickison Petroglyphs were the next stop.  A trail leads to several groupings of these insisted drawings in the cliffs and boulders, as well as to various viewpoints, of the surrounding landscape.  My favorite petroglyphs was of the “mad cyclist,” (my interpretation), who obviously represents the yellow jersey holder in an ancestral Native American Tour de Southwest cycle race!!!  There is a campground here (no water), but I followed a forest road and camped for three nights 1.4 miles in from the highway, topping up my AGM battery, and painting away.

“Mad Cyclist?”

There was a large anthill about twelve feet away from my car, and on the first evening I inadvertently stepped on a corner of it.  I was surprised to see that I had opened up access to several galleries.  I thought that there would have been several inches between the surface of the mound and the first tunnels, but evidently not.  Over the next days I watched them working on repairing the damage.  To make amends I also distributed a couple of ounces of Bob's Red Mill TVP (textured vegetable protein), which they hoiked away into the tunnels with great alacrity!  I'm assuming they were suitably grateful, and that mitigated to some extent my accidental misstep.  If I remember correctly, I understand that ants communicate with pheromones and scents, maybe through touch.  Sometimes I would watch an individual carrying a grain of sand, seemingly aimlessly, wondering if there was some plan he was following, but I could discern no logic as to where he finally placed it; sometimes within my damaging footprint and sometimes up on the sides or top of the mound.  Sometimes they would drop their load independently, but more than half the time I observed that at some point in their meandering, another ant, seemingly at random, would touch them and the load bearing ant would, at that point, drop his burden.  Was a message passed by touch; by scent; by pheromones?  Was there a logic to it?  For the time being, the ways of the ant remains a mystery to me. 

View from my campsite
near Hickison Petroglyphs,
looking back the way I had come.

Ooops!

Sorry, Guys!

Austin was the next town encountered on Hwy 50, and is the smallest of the three between Baker (outside Great Basin National Park, and just inside the Nevada/Utah border), and Fallon, NV.  Built on a steep hill, with two petrol stations, and no real grocery store, I was only able to top up my water supply from the garden hose outside the closed Ranger Station, at the bottom of the hill.

I drove up this valley,
from left to right, back in ’13, it was.

Loneliest Road in America.

From here I proceeded on Old Hwy 50 through the Desatoya Mountain Range, to Eastgate, on the western flank of the range, and followed a forest road five miles to the entrance of Big Den Creek Canyon.  Thus ensconced amongst the Junipers and Pinyon Pines, I remained for the next six days including the Memorial Day weekend.  There is a rough trail that leads up the canyon to a lower waterfall (where I discovered a geo-caching box), and somewhere beyond that an upper waterfall (that I did not get to).  I learned of the upper falls by reading entries in the geo-cache log, which also mentions a rattlesnake seen ten feet from the box back in `07; I had wondered about rattlesnakes when negotiating several scree-slopes that the footpath crosses.  Evidently it was just a tad too early for them to be out yet.  But the lizards were out here; three in residence in the large campfire ring I camped next to.  The trailhead, the trail itself and the waterfalls are not marked on my maps, and there is only a small sign out on the highway, five miles away, that says “wildlife viewing area,” to indicate anything of interest up this way.  I found the site through the free campsites app.

Looking west from my Big Den Creek camp.

Shower fading away.

The entrance to Big Den Creek Canyon,
in the Evening Light.

In the gloaming.

What did I say before ‘bout flowers?!

Cuddles.

The lower waterfall …
not spectacular,
but pleasant enough.