A Journey Through Time
One of the things I like about visiting Oregon most is their book of scenic byways. We haven’t found a state or province with a better guide than to open the Oregon Scenic Byways booklet and see all 27 routes on the state map. Other places have scenic byways, like Idaho and Washington States, but they’re not as easily read or navigated. Oregon, is by far the best.
The Journey Through Time Scenic Byway is a 460 km 8–10 hour drive through Eastern Oregon. It begins in The Dalles, which marks the end of the Colombia Scenic Gorge, and finishes in Baker City, a historic town on the Oregon Trail near the Idaho boarder. Our original plan was to skip certain parts of it for a more direct route across the state but we forgot to turn and so we drove the majority of the route.
Cruising along empty two-lane roads, I remembered why I enjoy road tripping so much. The openness of the landscape welcomes us as we roll hill over hill, the only car for miles. The roads are so straight that speed limits mean nothing and we go at our own pace, both fast while driving and slow when stopped. It turns out that the destination matters less than the freedom to move and the freedom to choose. We go where we want to when we want to. This is why I wish we had our own car.
The Byway travels through several dusty ghost towns and past old farms with farm equipment rusting in the fields. It’s a desolate place but rather enjoyable as we listen to John Green’s Paper Towns audio book in-between beats of Taylor Swift.
We pass a bridge that crosses an oasis like river with vibrant bushes amongst red dry hills from the dinosaur era. It looks like the land before time.
The major stopping point is a little label on the state map that I notice, The Painted Hills. It is just one section of the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, a set of three parks known for well preserved fossils. It is best seen in the late afternoon under a golden sun, precisely when we happened to arrive.
This area was once a floodplain. The red bands were formed during a wetter climate while the yellow bands are from a drier climate. The black spots are manganese that indicate where plants once were. We took some photos at a good lookout with a great view just before sunset.
Down a gravel road that appears to be less frequented is a short walk around some painted hills called the Painted Cover Trail. It was nice that there were only a few other people around and we had the place to ourselves. The Geology is stunning and untouchable, as people who touch the painted hills or throw rocks on them forever change them.
We didn’t have plans for a camp site but fortunately there was a signpost with a map and a list of campgrounds in the area. Our first attempt was at a campground in a small town of less than 10 buildings. It ended up being a city park. There were some tents but it looked pretty sketchy so we continued on and found a spot off the main road and half way up a mountain side. It was peacefully quiet, in the pine trees and we got a good rest.
In the morning we heard logging trucks rolling down the roadway but that didn’t bother us as we cooked some breakfast and got on our way. Next destination: Idaho.
