Boys fall camping Trip 2024

2nd half of October and weather looking like it might pop into the 70’s in town we decided to head out for a short fall getaway to one of our favorite family spots - little crater campground at Paulina Lake. It’s the latest we have been there in the year and the campground was almost empty with only a few locals there. The hot springs were almost empty on a sunny Saturday afternoon!

Dinner, smores, fire and a sunset made for a good evening and we also got to see the comet again after dark. 

Sunday morning was cool and windy but warmed up nicely and we went to the obsidian flow for a quick hike. 

Winter Camping at Crater Lake

The weather has been unseasonably warm the last month. This weekend Hunter and I went to Crater lake to go winter camping. It was spring conditions. Hunter has been investing in backcountry skis and just got some climbing skins so we spent time practicing. 

We then headed up and found a camp that allowed us to watch the sunset. While warm in the day it was still getting down to about 21 overnight. 

Sunday after getting back to the car we drove up to the crater rim by the hotel (only part of the road open in winter).  It was amazing to see the lake with snow. 

The Sound of Silence (Waldo Lake)

Abbie really wanted to do a canoe camping trip this year so this weekend I took her to Waldo lake. We have camped there a few years back but there are some dispersed wilderness sites on the other side of the lake that you have to search to find. 

The weather was spectacular this weekend, especially given it was the last weekend in September 

We launched from Islet boat ramp. The water was like glass most of trip across the lake  

We found a great spot on a point on the far western side of the lake with the tent spot hidden up in the trees but still with a view of the lake and lots of rocky beach to explore.  Waldo does not allow any gas engines and with no people anywhere near us to was amazingly quiet.  It actually sounds strange to hear no humam-made noises.

We had a great time sitting around the fire and making dinner together.  We made pizza and salad for dinner with campfire cones for desert!

We rose when the sun got up- had coffee and hot chocolate followed by a breakfast of egg burritos using eggs from Abbie’s chickens!  

Our trip back across was not quite as calm once we got out on the open water so it was good practice for abbie. 



Idaho Festival of Lights

We went with 3 other families (Lovejoys, Murphys, Swansons) to Coeur d’Alene Idaho for a long weekend to go to a floating lantern festival. Drove over Thursday up through Spokane so new territory for Us. Got to our campground for the weekend - Camp Coeur d’Alene.  The others three families all brought trailers so we opted for a cabin. Being early May we didn’t want to chance tent weather. The cabin was awesome. 

We spent some time exploring Coeur d’Alene and surrounding area. Simply beautiful. 

The festival was Saturday night.  Everyone had a lantern that came with a marker to draw pictures and or write a message on.  The wind was a little high which made for some interesting lantern trajectories. There were a few thousand people there!  

6th Annual Boys Fall Camping Trip - South Central Oregon (2019)

Our annual fall trip this year was postponed due to harvest season in my new business so instead of our usual late September timing, we ended up going in early November and the weather could not have been more perfect - especially for November.   Warm and sunny but not too hot during the day and cool crisp evenings.  

This year, I selected a backcountry driving adventure that started in Christmas Valley in South Central Oregon and weaved north on backcountry fire roads eventually existing 100 miles north east of Bend on Hwy 20.  We were joined by two other families this year - the Murphy Boys (Dad Patrick, and son Severin) who came with us last year to Big lake and the Swanson Boys (Dad John, with sons Shepard, and Ozzy).  We had 3 main targets on this trip.  A place called Crack in the Ground, the state champion Western Juniper, and Derrick Cave.    

Previous years:

After driving south and east of Bend for about 3 hours past fort Rock to Christmas valley and then north we hit crack in the ground.  I had heard it was interesting but it turned out to be the hit of the trip!  A mix of scrambling, canyoneering and caving all in one.  It was way better than any of us had expected and probably one of the top places I have ever visited in oregon.  We spent all afternoon exploring the cracks.  All boys - kids and adults had a blast!

Given that its November and the days being really short, we decided to continue heading north to look for a potential camp site so we would have time to setup, cook and unwind before it got dark.  About 5 miles north we came to Green mountain camp site which seemed perfect.  A great high desert view, and not a single other person in the camp ground besides us.  

We had a fire and told stories and of course had smores - of the gourmet variety with caramel/chocolate and peanut butter/chocolate.  

The next morning arrive cool and crisp to start but quickly started warming up.  We found a good spot facing into a hill and spend a couple hours allowing the kids to shoot cans.  John brought a beautiful wood .22 rifle and I had a .22 pistol for the kids to plink with.  

Late morning we got rolling north with our first target an old water pumping station we had heard about. 

Next we started off to find the oldest western juniper in Oregon.  This turned out to be quite a challenge with the spider web of fire roads that were not labelled correctly in many locations.  Finally when we were just about to give up we found it!

After having some lunch at the state champion juniper, we rolled out to head to Derrick cave.  Less than 30 minutes got us to Derick Cave which turned out to be an amazing very large lava tube.  

On the way there PJ was with John and John let him steer his truck (an F350).  PJ thought he was pretty cool. 

One of, if not the tallest caverns I have been in in oregon.  It had to be 70 ft in spots.

With the day getting late, we put it into high gear and headed north towards highway 20.  The backroads were fun and uneventful with everyone getting home just after dark.  A great adventure through the heart of the central Oregon high desert backcountry.   

Annual Labor Day Family Campout - 2019

We had such a great time last year camping a Little Crater Campground, on Paulina Lake in Newberry Crater south of Bend that we decided to go with the same place again this year.    Unfortunately Abbie was a little under the weather this year recovering from Pneumonia, but we made the best of it.  Some friends from Church - Pete and Dara came up Saturday for dinner which was really fun.

 Around Camp


Hike up the "Big Obsidian Flow"


Pete And Dara Visit with a big batch of Dutch oven Chili!


On the lake and of course a visit to the hot springs




Gearhart Wilderness Adventure

Kelly and Abbie were down in California, so the boys went away to play for the weekend.  I had picked this book up from Costco earlier in the year and figured this would be a good opportunity to pick out a weekend adventure trip.

Our destination was the Gearhart Wilderness area.  See this map below of Oregon - its in the extreme south central/eastern part of the state.

On Friday we drove after work south and stopped and camped at a campground just off the 97 just North of Chiloquin. 

Saturday we got onto the route - basically a circumnavigation of Gearhart mountain on fire roads.  This was true eastern Oregon back country driving.  Very few people (even though we were in the heart of tourist season).   The driving was beautiful and being a little higher in elevation made for perfect warm days (not hot) and cool nights.  One of the neat spots we hit Saturday morning was an old fire tower still standing and accessible but no longer in operation for what looked like many years.  

After the fire tower we continued on to our next stop Campbell lake where we cooled off, had some lunch and tried fishing. (no luck).

For our evening camp spot Saturday we have a few options but we ultimately chose a campsite called Sandhill Campground.  We had it to ourselves - not a soul besides our group for the afternoon and evening and not even a car drove by.    It had the Sprague river bubbling through the campsite giving us our own private river beach.  A magical place.  (I have heard it gets busy in the fall for hunting season).

The campground also had water accessible by an old fashioned hand pump.  Boys had never seen a working hand-pump so Noah decided he wanted to get his water that way.


5th Annual Fall boys camping Trip - Big Lake OR (2018)

We just got back from our 5th annual fall boys camping trip in 2018.  This year we went with some friends that the kids go to school with and the location was Big Lake near Hoodoo ski area West of Sisters.  Dad Patrick with boys Severin and Ben.  Big lake is actually a bit of a misnomer, as the lake isn't that big but it was super 'blue'.    

Previous years:

This year we went the 3rd week of September so we didn't have to worry about deer hunting season (rifle).  I think the 3rd week of September will likely become our defacto standard going forward.   This year the weather was colder and rainy, but we were up at 5000 ft so that could have been part of the reason.  Due to soccer games we got a late start Saturday afternoon so the trip felt shorter than usual.  Going forward we agreed that even if their is soccer games, we might just skip them and even make it a 2-night deal Friday and Saturday.  As with previous years the requirement for this trip is that it cannot be car camping, and must have some sort of 'remote' aspect to it even if just a little.  

4th Annual Fall boys Camping trip (2017)

We just got back from our annual fall boys camping trip for 2017.  

Previous years:

A little later than average this year - Sept 30/Oct 1 and the weather was a little more cool and unsettled but still a great time.  This year we were joined by PJ for the first time!  Kelly was a little nervous about this but decided to ok it.  The trip this year was via canoe upon request from Noah.   The plan was to travel along an ~8 mile stretch of the Deschutes river from Tenino boat launch just below Wickiup reservoir to Wyeth boat launch just above Pringle falls.  This stretch has no rapids and is a nice easy down-river float.  Here is a map of the route and our selected primitive camp spot (blue dot) along the river.

We dropped one car at Wyeth and had Kelly drive us to the put in point at Tenino.  Here we are at the put in and just starting down river.

We selected this camp spot about 2/3 down river to our exit as it was relatively remote.  Had a great little eddy to pull the canoe into to unload.

I had a few new recipes I wanted to try on this trip.  The first was pizza over a camp stove. I originally learned this with NOLS many years ago but haven't tried it recently.  Chose to top it with peppercorn feta, kalamata olives, and arugula on half (for Noah and I).  First pic is Hunter helping me by cutting up olives.  Of course the trip wouldn't be complete without hot-dogs over a fire which we did later when the wind died down.  I also cooked a peach cobbler for desert.

Here is a video of the kids throwing pin cones in the river on a walk for entertainment.
After a cool night we rose Sunday morning with a little rain to start but clearing to partly cloudy with a cool wind but not bad for October.  For breakfast I made Fresh sourdough french toast with raspberries and pumpkin spice maple syrup along with a side bacon.  It was tasty!