Sunriver

Well, here I am, at last, with time to write about our little holiday in the mountains. In a nutshell: we had a blast, and we definitely got the most 'bang for our buck.' We were up in Sunriver from Friday through Wednesday--our first real 'vacation' since Chubbers was born.

Our Holiday week started out on a funky note. But, then, when you're talking about me, would it start out any other way? We had hoped B.J. would luck out and get Thursday, July 5Th off, so that we could head up on the Fourth of July--but no such luck. Ya win some, you lose some, and with that we packed up the van on Thursday evening/Friday morning and were about ready to head out of the driveway (quite literally, we were all buckled in, engine running) and B.J. gets a call on his cell phone.


'Oh crap.' I thought to myself. Something has come up--the house caught fire, the roads were washed out, lemmings are falling from the sky (hey, when I panic, I do it up right). Nothing so dramatic as all that, thankfully. Just an hour and a half detour added to our drive to swing by the in-laws house and pick up the accidentally forgotten pool passes for our vacation (they were going to be dropped off at the Sunriver house...but life got in the way). No biggie. There's a reason why I have a built-in DVD player in my van--PARENTAL SANITY!

En route to getting the passes in Eugene, my meticulously mapped out Letterboxing (click the link, and it will fill you in--yes, I keep saying I'll write a blog, I've been too lazy so far...) route got all messed up--as in the stops were off of HWY 20/22 and we would be driving up HWY 58 to get to our destination. I decide this won't work, and, besides, after my raspberry mocha from the Evil Empire I had to pee, and thus the Peanut and I detoured to the U. of O. to a) go pee, and b) print out a new letterboxing agenda that worked with HWY 58. (Yes, indeed, I am insanely obsessed with my hobby.).

It was interesting to see the changes at my Alma Mater. It has been a total of 7 years since I received my B.A., and 5 years since my Master's degree. The exterior of the university hasn't much changed, but I noticed subtle interior changes; changes that made me feel old. That surely sucked. I had to ask the librarian for help (how on earth do you print out stuff anymore...?). But, with a little patience we were 'good to go.' With new letterboxing agenda and little Peanut in hand, we walked across campus, met B.J. outside of MacArthur Court, and yo-ho-ho and away we go.

The drive is beautiful, and we've forgotten how green and lush the vegetation is on the way up to Willamette Pass. It had been a full 4 years since we had driven to Sunriver via 58. Time flies when you're having babies.


We stop in LaPine to do a little letterboxing/hiking. It is good for the kiddos (and us) to stretch and move around; we reach our box and are rewarded with views like this: The view of the Deschutes river from the hidden letterbox location at "Big Tree" (incidentally, a 1,000 foot tall ponderosa pine tree--'big tree' as a site name seemed a trifle understated).



When we make it to Sunriver we immediately dump off our stuff and head to the pool. It is hotter than a frying pan, and we're all hot, dusty, tired, and in serious need of some refreshing. The pool definitely does the trick. In fact, we spend every afternoon for each day of our holiday at either the North or South pool--miraculously (and thanks to a neurotic sunblock-a-holic) nobody but B.J. (who refuses to wear sunblock) gets burned. Yippee! I have accomplished my personal goal of no sun burnt babies and very little tan lines. I just love the new continuous spray sunblocks--I can even get my own back with them, and they dry almost instantly. (Yes, this is me in my swimsuit from hell.)


We did a lot of walking around in Sunriver, but the majority of our walking around and hiking came in the form of letterboxing. This is the insane (and utterly fun) letterboxing itinerary we followed: Pilot Butte--I just love this picture I took of of Peanut and Chub-chub on the top of the butte:


Peanut climbed up on the post all by herself, with no prompting from me, and as you can see Chubbers is in the dirt--something that would be repeated again, and again, during this trip, prompting us to nickname Chubbers "Pigpen" in honor of the chronically filthy Peanuts character.

We also went to sites at: Shevlin Park Covered Bridge (in Tumalo); Sawyer Park: #1 (couldn't find box 2 or 3--very frustrating); Hollinshead Park; Widgi Creek (next-door to the Seventh Mountain Resort) and Cascade Lakes Scenic Byway.


Another box we found was called Quacker Backer Central Oregon Where I waited with the kiddos in the van since it was out in the brush (we're talking no paved roads, here) and not developmentally appropriate for a 1.5 year old and a 4 year old to tag-along. While waiting I got out of the van periodically to look to see if B.J. had headed back yet (he was far enough out I couldn't see or hear him) and in the process, brain-trust that I can be, [I am not thinking of wild animals out here] I startle and in turn am startled by an 800lb. ELK! I about peed my pants (I had to go already and was doin' the dance) with fright.


It was at that point I, after I recovered my wits, I began looking at the various animal tracks in the dust and mud where we were, and only then did I notice the abundance of Elk and Deer tracks (cool) and (gulp) Lynx tracks! I could hardly wait for B.J. to get back--all the while having visions of him being mauled violently after unknowingly startling a sleeping wild cat while looking for a letterbox. In the end, no harm, no foul. It turned out to be a really cool and really, really, remotely placed stamp.


We had several other 'attempted' letterboxes--boxes we tried to locate but later found out I missed finding one by 5' (grrr! how frustrating) and also finding out a number of the boxes were missing (double grrr! it would be nice if the box owners would take the 'clue' out of circulation if they aren't available!!).


One of our adventures that resulted from chasing down a missing box was visiting the Lava Cast Forest. When we embarked on this journey, we didn't realize that it involved going off-road to get to the hike. Off-road. In. A. Mini-van. (secretly, I think that this was so totally exciting!). If I still had had my Explorer, going off-road, down dirt trails, over curbs, through small rivers--no big deal. But, this was in a van. Pretty gutsy. The picture doesn't look too bad, but just imagine an old-time aluminum wash board. Yep, you know the kind. Now, apply that zig-zag pattern, horizontally with 3-4" grooves to the road. For NINE miles. Then you have an idea. The kids had a blast. Little kids love to go "uhhhhh" (a monotonous tone with the voice) when going over a few bumps in suburbia, well, they had the time of their lives going 'uhhhh' for 9 miles each way. B.J. and I laughed so hard. Where is Bill Cosby, when you want him? We ended up not finding the box (the author informed me it was missing) but the sites, and geology we learned about was worth it--me being the dyed-in-the-wool-geek that I am, I just ate it up. (I'm going to ROCK! at Jeopardy! some day, all because I went to the Lava Cast Forest). We saw where the Lava flow had gone around the trunks of trees and, miraculously made 'casts' of the trees. Pretty cool beans.


We also went on a wild goose chase at Newberry National Volcanic Monument. It was o.k. though, because, again (me being a geek) we learned a ton about our local geology, and got in a couple of cool hikes (Big Obsidian Flow & Newberry Crater). The views were spectacular.



We spent the entire week together, as a family. It was fun, relaxing, and a good way for all of us to connect. However, like all good things, this too, had to come to an end.

We (B.J. and I) have been coming up to Sunriver together for the past 11 years (B.J. has been coming since he was 4 or 5 years old). We have shared a lot of good times together at the Sunriver house, we've grown, changed, and learned a lot. So, it was with bittersweet tears that we said goodbye this time. This visit was our last visit, ever, to this house. The family has decided that the house has served its purpose and it is time to move on. And thus has ended another chapter in our lives together: Goodbye Sunriver.










We made the most of it, and it was a good run.