On Fathers day after church we with the weather clear and warm we took a drive just south of town to Lava Lands and took the shuttle up to the top of Lava butte for lunch and a short walk around the crater.
Saturday was clear. The mountain had been getting dumped on the previous week so we decided to head up as a family. There is an amazing amount of snow for this late in the year. One of the highest snow totals on record. It will definitely be open until its official close on memorial weekend at the end of may. They are even running snowboard and ski summer camps up there this summer. We will likely try and get up one more time in May.
After some continued stormy weather this past week up at Mt Bachelor, Saturday rose Sunny! Close to a foot of snow has fallen at the mountain over the past week and with fewer people skiing at this time of the year we were hopeful for some powder... which we got! Amazing for mid April.
We met up with our friends - the Bercots (Eric and Joe) for some runs and had lunch at the mid-mountain lodge out on the sunny patio. Great day!
Day after Christmas rose sunny so we went with our friends the Bercots to the Wanoga snow park area about half way to Mt bachelor for some sledding!
Video 1: Kevin & PJ
Video 2: Kelly & Abbie
Video 3: Hunter (back), Joe Bercot (middle), Noah (front)
Video 4: Kevin and Kelly (check out the air time!)
September now has a tradition of a Donaldson boys fall camping trip. First trip was in 2014, where we canoe camped on Sparks lake. 2015 we did a backpacking trip to Benson lake which was the first backpack for Hunter and Noah. This year in 2016, we backpacked again - this time up Tam MacAurthor rim above 3 creeks lake in the 3-Sisters wilderness. We have been to 3-creeks lake in the summer as a family but this time our target was to camp out on 'The Prow' - a high point cliff that overlooks the 3 creeks basin at 7732 ft elevation. (The parking area at the lake is at 6550). The hike to the Prow and back is about 5.3 miles so this would be the longest backpack for the boys to date. As they will tell you - a big difference when you have a pack on your back vs just a day hike.
We left Bend about 2:30 Saturday after the last soccer game and got on the trail about 3:45. Here are a few shots on the way up. You can see the prow clearly in the second photo.
Here are some shots from the top and the cliff area around the prow.
We set up camp about a 100 yards back from the prow in some trees. While this is high fire season we set up a very small fire to take the chill out. Noah got inventive and started toasting fig newtons on sticks. After fire was out we watched the stars for a while - amazing since it was so dark.
Sunday morning I got up to enjoy the sunrise and after breakfast, we decided to do a hike over towards broken top to see if we could see the lake in the crater as well as get some sweet views of the 3 sisters. I had been to broken top crater back in August from the other side and wanted to see if we could link it up from this side. Hiked for about 1.5 miles to a point where we could see it but the scrambling got a little dicey so we decided to turn back to camp. Boys had fun building cairns on the way back as well as sliding down a snow slope still around from last winter. Got back to camp just before 11.
After packing up camp with slightly lighter packs we had a quicker (downhill) and relatively uneventful hike back down getting to the car around 1:30. Enjoyed dipping our feet in the lake looking back up at where we had been. Of course we stopped in Sisters for an ice cream at snow cap before driving home.
I took Hunter and Noah on a day hike today as they wanted to try something longer. Hunter wants to to South Sister so I thought this might be interesting practice, plus the books said it was very unknown but beautiful. It was a lot of off trail hiking and scrambling with approx 11 miles of hiking completed and 2300 ft of vertical taking up up over 7700 ft in elevation.
The trail was pretty uneventful moving through the Pole Creek burn area for the first 2 miles with filtered views of the surrounding mountains.
From here we scrambled up further to see if we could find this supposed lake... I was not hopefully but the guide book said it was there if you just scrambled up a little more. Then Boom - as we crested the moraine it came into view.
On the way down - we followed the creek properly and what a treat. Green lush valley, bubbling stream, tasty water.
Before Pat and Sue departed back to California we decided to take them to see Sparks lake. We have visited there many times but we never get tired of visiting.
This year Abbie's birthday fell on our vacation to Black Butte. Since her two cousins - Olivia (turning 2) and Charlotte (turning 1) are both August babies and we were all together we thought it would be fun to celebrate the 3 girl cousins together.
Fun horseback ride that allowed us to do a number of trotting sections. Abbie loves riding horses! In the group photo from left to right: Abbie, Sue (Kelly's mom), Hunter, Jenn (Kelly's sister), Kelly, Kevin.
