GETAWAY SERIES: Camping in Oregon Parks
In one of my previous posts, I talked about the road trip book I got for my birthday and the successful first camping and road trip. Since then, my boyfriend and I been trying to find the time to take another weekend away, using this book as a rough guide. Instead of following one of the pre-designated trips, we decided to just go camping and used the book to figure out where we wanted to stay.
On Friday, we started our trip down to Oregon. We realized on the way that there was a burn ban in the state so we couldn't have a campfire. To make up for that, we bought a little one burner and some small propane tanks. After getting those initial last minute materials, we made our way to our first campsite, Silver Falls State Park. We spent the evening cooking hot dogs and playing card games. A truly picture perfect camping evening.
One of my favorite parts of the weekend was our hike at Silver Falls on Saturday. We didn't have time to see all ten waterfalls the park is home to, but we were able to get to two of them! We first hiked down a steep trail to Twin Falls. From there, we went less than half a mile to Middle North Falls. We were able to go behind the waterfall before winding our way down for a better straight-on view. It was so beautiful and such a wonderful experience to share together. I will admit though, the hike back up that steep hill was a lot of work and we both ended that hike dripping in sweat.
After our time at Silver Falls State Park, we headed further south and spent a little time in Salem. We had a delicious lunch at Bo & Vine Burger Bar and wandered around the shelves at The Book Bin. It was a good little pit stop before we kept driving.
Our second campsite was in Deschutes National Forest at Cold Springs Campground. This campground was a little more spread out and our site wasn't directly right next to other people, so it gave us a little more space for ourselves. Here we were able to build a camp fire which provided us some extra light after our propane lantern decided to be a bust. Right when we got to our campsite, we set up our fire and chairs to spend a little time reading and relaxing after the car rides we had been through. We did have a bit of a hard time when it came to dinner because there were a crazy amount of gnats just constantly around us! I swear, my boyfriend barely put the bug spray down because they were everywhere! Thankfully we were able to escape them in our tent when we went to bed.
Sunday was our day to drive back to Washington and I even got behind the wheel for a few hours. Overall, it was a wonderful weekend where I found myself enjoying camping more and more. I can't wait for our next little weekend getaway!
Here's me, putting our new one burner to good use, cooking up our dinner!
Twin Falls was slightly obscured to us, so my boyfriend went to try and get a closer look.
One of my favorite parts of our weekend trip was this waterfall, Middle North Falls. Behind the waterfall, there was a cutout in the rock that people could walk through and we were able to wander our way down to get a better view. This was such a cool experience, something that I had never done before.
We stopped in Salem and swung through Bo & Vine Burger Bar. Look at this burger! The two of us walked out with full bellies, feelin' good.
On our way to Sisters, OR, where our second campsite was, we made a spontaneous stop at the Detroit Dam. I literally said at the very last minute, "Pull over here!"
This is one half of the view we were met with when we walked across the dam. Absolutely beautiful!
I was taking a nap in the car when my boyfriend suddenly woke me up to check out this view. He had pulled over to see Mt. Washington peeking through the trees. I think it was worth being woken up from my nap for.