August 9, 2014

August 9, 2014

From Pendleton, OR we traveled south thru country that started out as dry grass ranchland but quickly turned into steep forested creek valleys. It was scenic but the very winding roads made for slow progress. Turning west didn’t help. Eventually after more than three hours we arrived at the main unit of John Day Fossil Beds National Monument. Like Washington and Idaho, eastern Oregon has seen significant volcanic activity over the last 50 million years. Here much of the early deposits were ash-like burying and preserving a wide variety of mammal and plant life over a very long geologic window.

We first do a short hike along the Island in Time trail into the heart of Blue Basin. The ash bed here is hundreds of feet thick and has eroded into a rock amphitheater with a bright blue-green color. Afterwards we head to the Visitor Center to see fossils being delicately exposed. We then wander through the museum which has lots of examples of the wide variety of fossils found here.

From John Day, we travel east to Prineville, where we get a nice lakeside campsite at a county park. After dinner, we sit and watch the full moon rise over the lake surface. The weather is delightfully cool and dry. A great night to sit out and enjoy nature.