Camping in Bend

Katie D.

July 25, 2010 - 9:10 PM

Announcing another fabulous weekend!

Bend, Oregon, is a beautiful little city on the Eastern side of the Cascade mountains. Officially, Bend is "high desert" terrain, which means scattered pine forrests, dry grasses, and hot summer days. It's also volcanic territory, with distant mountains offset by incredibly dramatic extinct volcanoes, rising alone or in groups against the sky. It is gorgeous, rugged terrain, with some of the best camping, rock climbing, rafting, and mountaineering in Oregon.

One of my best friends, Nathan, is from Bend. Many times during the past four years my friends and I have taken advantage of the incredible hospitality of his family and taken weekend trips to visit.

This weekend my friends Madeline, Devin, Lesley, and Stephanie loaded up for a camping adventure and drove the two and a half hours up into the Cascades along the McKenzie River, climbing through the dense, lush forests of the western slopes until crossing into the rain shadow of the Eastern side.

Mountains always feel like home to me.

We camped in a truly fabulous location, between the slopes of Mount Bachelor and South Sister. Sparks Lake is a gorgeous lake, surrounded by well-maintained trails and closed to motorized boats. It was crowded with kayakers, canoers, hikers, swimmers, and an astounding number of mountain dogs boating, swimming, or hiking right along.

The area around the lake was all old volcanic rock. We found outcroppings of pumice stones, as well as huge formations of volcanic stone. Somehow the area was shattered into ravines and small canyons around the lake. This sometimes meant a two-foot step, and other times involved climbing ten feet down into a canyon, only to climb up the other side a mere eight feet later. It was exhausting and exhilarating, carrying our camping gear and putting to use some of the rock climbing skills I've learned over the last years. I've never seen terrain like it before.

The camping itself was wonderful. Swimming in the lake during the day, hot dogs over the fire at night. Mosquitoes and stars and huge mountains looming on the near horizon. We told stories, took naps, collected firewood, and explored. The lake was shallow and calm, with ducks, geese, and a startling flight of migrating cranes.

The experience was bittersweet because it was also my farewell to Nathan. He leaves next Saturday to spend a year teaching English in Japan. At least a year. He's been an incredible friend of mine these four years, and I'm so sad to see him go. But with an adventure like this to end our college years, it still seems like a continuing story, rather than a bookend on a friendship. Plus it was another memory of adventure together.

This weekend also reminded me of my passion for outdoor adventures: for physical challenges, for moonlit nights and days without knowing what time it is, and for the kind of close bonding that happens when you're alone without the electronic distractions of our modern lives. I love the Eugene and Oregon communities for the passion for outdoor experiences: for the UO Outdoor Program and the vast number of UO students who spend weekends in the wilderness, experiencing all that this place has to offer in the way of beauty and adventure. One of my reasons for coming to the UO was the chance to build new outdoor skills and experiences. It's also a reason I'm staying. I hope to have many more stories like this in the years to come, although it is impossible to know what I'll have time for when my graduate program starts. For now, it was a beautiful weekend with good friends. Yet another fabulous adventure.