Been to Bend

Been to Bend? – Monday and Tuesday April 6-7. 2009

We arrived in Bend on the 6th and found a tent site on the way into town at Tomalo State Park along the rip roaring Deschutes River. They have cute little Yurts for 30 bucks a night but no - we wanted to brave our coldest night yet in a tent at 31 degrees. Luckily the campground had super hot solar showers and wasn’t far to a Starbucks that I could cozy up to a Latte at the next morning while Patti made some stock trades. Anyway, we quickly set up camp and headed downtown to find the Bend Brewing Co. to catch the NCAA final. Careful if you go there - The Black Jack Porter is 10% ABV! And wouldn’t you know, what had to be one of the nicest locals in town, sits down right next to us at the bar. He also just happens to be a bike ridding, fly fishing, powder hound who’s a partner at a Bend money management firm and enjoys good conversation. A perfect One Night STAN. For two hours we talked story with Loren Gard about our Radical Sabbatical, the world financial market and Bend’s local economy before getting into the best Mtn. Bike trails and steelhead streams within striking distance. Loren – Thank You for the Smith Rock Tip! Smith Rock SP, about 15 miles north of Bend, was on of the coolest state parks that I’ve been and was well worth the detour from our route. He recommended it because it had nice trails, some interesting geological features supporting good climbing and was drier there and more rideable this time of year. But Wow! - what I didn’t expect was the magnitude of the rock spires dripping with world class climbers on belay, and a beautiful river at the foot of the cliffs with a perfect MB contour trail meandering along its edges through the canyon. My much missed bike’n buddies from Kauai would have been impressed. We had a good hour and a half ride, took a few pics for our Blog and soaked up the scenery for a while before hoping back in our truck and heading on down the road. Of course we took another “Over the River and Through the Woods Oregon Scenic Byway” that was the route for the first Trans American Automobile Rally on Hwy 20 along the Santiam River across the mountains to Corvalis. We called our friend Bryan, an OSU BEAV, now in NYC, along the way for a quick recommendation on a place to eat dinner in the great little college town - Corvalis. Thanks Bry - the eats were good, cheap and quick but the day was short so we couldn’t stay long and started the two hour drive to our next destination - the Hawthorne House Hostel in Portland. Should be interesting because we are both hostel virgins.