More from Crooked River…

Enjoyed my stay here next to the river quite a bit. There were many bikeable roads to travel, several properties for sale to explore, a nice bar cafe to visit, and a convenience store with a pizza, sandwich shop sorta setup. They had a fairly extensive menu actually, but I never ate there. I’d ride over there in the mornings, get a fancy coffee and read the local newspaper. The store is just beyond that white storage and shop building there in the background of the pic below. I’m now parked in my new permanent spot they had me move to. The services are very new so no worries about the power faltering or bad water. Each day around 11 AM it would get warm enough to need the AC, but it’s still much more comfortable here then in the desert of California. And by 4 pm it was back to comfortable so I’d go do some bike riding.

I was over the ‘strong’ dizziness stage so I went over to the canyon the day before I left for Walla Walla and carefully inched my way over to the edge. I’d get a couple shots and back way off for a few minutes for the woosieness to pass before coming back to the edge for another shot or two. It’s an impressive canyon. 

Really impressive.  And deep. You can see why I couldn’t risk hanging out near this edge for long, what with the dizzy spells. My next trip here I’m going to try and find a way down to that trail. That would make a great hike down there next to the river. Way off in the distance, north east-ish, is a weird outcropping. Compared to the flat top mesas in this area it’s kinda weird. Off in that direction is the Columbia River. We’re in the foothills here. Lots of good farmland around. Here are some animal trails alongside the hillside. Antelope most likely. This area has seen lots of human activity for decades so I doubt they’re still around.  The river, canyon, and cliff is off in that direction.Really enjoying my stay here, but it was time to head on up to Walla Walla. It’s just a short jaunt north up to the Columbia River then east along the Walla Walla River, only 2 & 1/2 hours travel time, so I leave late in the morning.

I needed propane so I asked the proprietor before I left where I could get some and he tells me there’s a price war going on between the distributer in Terrebonne (the closest small village along US-97) and the one in Redmond, 8 miles further south. I couldn’t find a propane sign in Terrebonne so I kept going to Redmond and soon find a large propane fueling setup at the local feed & seed store. With a $1/gallon price. Whoa! So I top off both my tanks and it comes to $14.10. Nice!

I’d filled up in Florida back in January, and I only topped my house tank (I have two, a house tank and a tank for the generator), which took all of 11.6 gallons. At a whopping $56 bucks ($4.378/gallon plus tax). This time I got 14 gallons for $14. Not bad at all. I did spot the propane sign in Terrebonne as I passed later heading north and it’s at $1.25. Also a great price. The best I’ve seen for propane since the $1.50/gallon I found in 2004!

So after that happy money saving jaunt, off I head to Walla Walla. Get there early enough to do some shopping and arrive at my sister’s house early in the afternoon. In 90°F temps. Ick. But, she has a nice powerful AC so it’s comfortable inside anyway. Since I’m the first to arrive in town for the family reunion, it’s nice reminiscing with my sister. Remember my post months ago of how I’d stopped by my sister’s to say hi late in the day and left very early the next morning? Coming early this time to spend more quality time with sis was payback for that.

Next time, fun at the family reunion.