DAY FOUR - Prineville, Oregon (Oct. 1, 2007)

DAY FOUR - Prineville, Oregon (Oct. 1, 2007)
At the end of day three, we stayed at the Crater Lake B & B in Forth Klamath. Janet and family were great hosts (including two great dogs of Toby and Shiloh). Up to this point we had stayed in a converted elementary school, a traditional hotel and a B & B. We were just getting started in our lodging part of the adventure.

Our room at the Crater Lake B&B.

Our B & B was on the south side of Crater Lake. So we entertained the thought of driving back up to Crater Lake and try our luck at seeing the lake again. At the turn off to go through the park or around, we could tell the cloud cover was too dense. So instead of going back up to the summit again, we saved time and went around.

The day before, we did pick up some excellent books on Oregon hiking and campgrounds. Using these as a reference, we traveled up to Prineville Oregon. We had enough time (barely) to go on a hike at Stein’s Pillar.

The Steins Pillar trail is very deceiving, offering views of the pillar only for the last half mile of the trail, but don't expect a boring hike; the trail gives you plenty to look at all in a very short distance. The trail starts out meandering through a nice forest, but soon reaches open meadows that are covered with wildflowers during the spring. Many Cascade mountains and other green hills of the Ochoco Mountains can be seen from the open prairies. Eventually, the trail switchbacks down to the base of the tower, offering a very humbling view of the towering pinnacle.



We turned back before getting all the way to the base of the pillar. The trail wasn’t that well marked and the cloud cover was looking a bit intimidating at times. However, we were able to take a quick trip down down the road to a viewpoint of the pillar, which was amazing.

Getting back, we stopped off in Prineville to get some grub, some beer and some firewood. We were able to get a log cabin inside of an RV park. I was even able to find a link to it on the web, in case you are interested. ( http://www.rvparkreviews.com/regions/Oregon/Prineville.html ). We ended up chatting fireside with a gentleman named John that had just migrated out from the east coast. With the beer quickly gone, we broke out a bottle of Merlot from Duck Pond and chatted for at least 2 hours enjoying the evening and the fire.