Saturday, July 25, 2015
Today we moved from Redmond Expo RV Park to Eugene Mobile Village RV Park in Eugene, OR. The drive over was beautiful. We crossed the summit at 4813 ft elevation. Almost half the way, we followed the McKenzie River. The sun was in the wrong direction for me to get pictures during the drive.
Once we got to Eugene near the RV park we made reservations at, there were signs saying the road we needed was closed, but open to businesses.
This is the road. I'm standing at the entrance to the RV park looking back in the direction we came from. One side of the road is gravel and the other side is extremely deteriorated. We had to go VERY slow.
This is the entrance to the RV park.
This is the driveway into the office. We were not impressed.
We had to leave our toad at the office. No space for it at our assigned spot.
Our parking spot is not far from the office, thank the Lord! This whole place looks run down. The roads to get to our parking spot are much narrower than the entrance.
These 2 spots are the only spots in the RV park that will hold large rigs. We are glad we are only staying overnight. One of the pitfalls of not knowing more about a RV park before arriving. We just wanted 50amp so we could run the air conditioners.
Monday - Friday July 20 - 24, 2015
This week Tic will be working with the VCBers (men) and I will be hanging out with the ladies. The men are working on a 25,000 sq ft addition for the HBC. The addition was started by another group that worked for one week. They put up some of the framing. The VBCers started on this project June 29th. They work 2 weeks, 1 week off, then 2 more weeks. We are only here this week.
There were already a large number of trusses up when Tic started. Here they are getting ready to put up more trusses. Most of the framing in this picture was done by the VCBers.
You can see some of the interior walls being constructed.
One morning I finally caught them lifting one of the large trusses, to place on the roof supports.
Here they are close to setting the truss the in above picture.
This is the other end of the same truss shown in the previous picture.
One afternoon I noticed these clouds. I thought of angels watching over the VCBers working on the trusses. There was not a single accident this week. The men had lots of God's angles protecting them.
The men have also been working on decking the roof that is set.
Late one afternoon, Tic took this picture from inside one of the rooms constructed. The shadows and the blue sky make this picture really interesting!
After cleanup on Friday, July 24, one of the men rode up on one of the lifts and took this picture. What a view!!!
From this picture you cannot tell, but almost half the decking seen was put on this week. The men worked really hard. Tic enjoyed working with them.
Tomorrow we leave to head for the Oregon coast to spend next week with our daughter and her family. We are excited about having the opportunity to spend a week with Jessica and James and the 3 boys.
Sunday - Friday July 20 - 24, 2015
Sunday we moved from River Rim RV in Terrebonne to Redmond Expo RV Park in Redmond, OR. I think it was about a 30 min drive.
This is our parking site at the Expo RV Park. It is a nice RV park. it is all paved with concrete pads to park both your coach and car on. There are not any trees but what do you expect at an Expo Center RV park? It had clean restrooms with showers. The laundry room was also clean and all machines worked.
We are here in Redmond to spend the week working with the Volunteer Christian Builders to help with an expansion on the Highland Baptist Church (HBC).
I was hungry for Mexican food, so we had a late lunch, about 1:45 pm with the intention that we would not need dinner. We went to Madeline's.
Look at the size of this burrito. I took half mine home. The burrito was filled with pork cooked with green chilies (New Mexican style), rice and beans. More green chili sauce covered it with chopped tomatoes, chives and grated cheese. It was delicious!!!!
After lunch we got the car washed.
Dusty stayed in the Jeep as it rolled through. The workers actually scrubbed it with brushes before we started through the wash. It was the best drive-thru wash we ever had.
The next day as we were driving through town, we saw the clouds looked like they had green & red on the edges. See below.
We even took our sunglasses off to make sure we were seeing what we thought we were seeing. It was the most unusual thing we've seen.
Monday night's sunset was very pretty. This was taken at the Expo RV Park. Even though you see trees, they are only on the perimeters.
I'm making a separate post for the few pictures I took of the guys building the addition for the HBC.
Wednesday-Saturday, July 15-18, 2015
For the next few days it is going to be laundry, cleaning, grocery shopping and projects. Sometimes days to just "be" are wonderful.
About 8:30 pm one evening we decided to walk a few holes of the Crooked River Ranch Golf Course for exercise.
From one of the holes we could look up and see this house. What a view they have!
We saw this critter on our walk. When we got back to the RV park we learned that it is a rock chuck. Farmers around here consider them rodents to be shot.
We also saw several cottontail bunnies.
Here is our 07/15/15 sunset picture. Interesting cloud formations!
The next evening we were invited to a dinner for the Volunteer Christian Builders working at the Highland Baptist Church. We are working with them. The church members put together this dinner. It was held in a members barn, which was exceptionally clean. Apparently they hold parties here sometimes. I took a picture with my phone but when I put it into this post it was blurry so I'm leaving it out.
On our way home, the GPS took us a different route. We came upon this overlook and stopped to take pictures.
Here we are looking eastward up the canyon towards Crooked River Ranch.
This is looking straight across the gorge from the lookout. See the house on the ledge? And the river is still another 110 feet below, in the gorge.
This is looking westward down the canyon. The farm looks like a picture from long ago.
It is almost sunset time, so we decided to wait here at the overlook to watch the sunset.
This was just minutes before the sun went below the horizon. Don't the clouds look like a huge angel with wings?
Tic got this cool picture just seconds before the sun went below the horizon. Gorgeous!
The next day Tic decided he wanted to build a 12 element yagi cellular directional antenna. This is the driven element.
Now Tic has attached the base.
Here is the finished product. Our service is good here, so we cannot test it yet. We sometimes are parked in an area where our hotspot for Internet access is weak. Australians live vast distances apart and this design came from there. They use the same frequency. So the next time our signal is weak, we can give this a try.
Later in the evening this unique camper van pulled in.
It even has license plates from Europe. We were not sure which country.
Look at those driving lights!
The next morning we met the couple. They are from Germany and, yes, shipped the van to the US. We visited with them for probably 2+ hours. We learned that they converted this van themselves. She designed it and he built it. We got to tour the inside. The efficient use of space was incredible. We were both very impressed.
This is the precious couple we got the pleasure of meeting. They will finish their tour and then ship their van back to Europe.
We will be moving to Redmond tomorrow. Volunteer Christian Builders are here helping in the expansion of the Highland Baptist Church facilities. We will be there for a week ourselves to assist in however we can. Blog updates will pick up again after that.
Tuesday, July 14, 2015
As we would drive from our RV park into Terrebonne or Redmond, we passed a sign for Steelhead Falls. A quick search on the Internet revealed a description and directions.
It was a good thing we found directions, because after the sign on the main road, there were no more signs until we arrived at the trailhead.
We know this is going to be good. Anytime you start off downhill, you know you will have uphill on the way back.
Looking down at the Deschutes, the water is moving very fast.
From here, you are looking at the upriver part of the falls. If you were here with us, you could hear it too!
It appears that the river has run over the banks here in the past.
Beautiful. This waterfall is not real high, but the volume of water is abundant. Makes a loud noise!
After all of the fury of the dropping water, the serenity of the continuing stream of water.
Whoa, what is this? did we miss seeing Sasquatch?
Eagle eye Dusty has spotted Bambi, cooling his little heels.
Finally, as we drove out of the canyon, a humorous pair of gravestones. Notice the hands? And read the other name quickly. Yes, "my remains"!
This brings us up to date on our adventures. Next week we will work as Volunteer Christian Builders at a church in Redmond.
Sunday, July 12, 2015
We wore ourselves out yesterday, and rain was forecast so we thought a drive might be better than a hike. We are parked between two rivers, the Crooked River and the Deschutes River. The two merge just a short distance from us and become the Lake Billy Chinook.
We had been driving on the mesa or flat area above the rivers. We started down into the canyon, turned a corner, and there was this no-name waterfall. At least, we never found a name for it.
We are on the Crooked River side, huge body of water. That is a two level pontoon boat and a smaller boat near the center.
You can see how rugged the walls of the canyon, and what we think may be a game trail.
The dark area looks like normal soil with hardened lava ash above it.
We crossed a narrow bridge over the river, out to what is evidently an island. As we turned a curve in the road we saw a pullout and we had to stop and see what was special.
Petroglyph!
And, on display, the real thing.
There very well may have been more up in the rocks, but the area was fenced off, and we do not trespass.
This plaque is why we decided this was an island. A Google search revealed that it is called an island peninsula.
This is the Deschutes River side of the island peninsula.
It was starting to sprinkle, and the day was getting long, so we decided to head for home. This is the bridge to the island. The pontoon boat has moved in under the bridge.
Another look at the canyon walls.
Looks like there will be a pretty sunset tonight.
Dusty took this close-up, and it looks like a grass fire.
The news has reported grass fires, but none in our area, so perhaps it is just the sun shining thru the rain clouds.
The storm has passed, beautiful sunset, great day!
