Truck Camping

Columbia River Gorge, 2021

In our continued spring tour of Oregon our next stop after Sunset Bay was the Columbia River Gorge. The wildflowers are usually out early and reliably in the Gorge and this year did not disappoint. For this trip we stayed on the eastern end of the Gorge and camped out of Memaloose State Park. It served as a good base when higher elevation camps further out were still mostly under snow. From there, we were up Saturday morning and off to find a trail to hike. Our first planned stop had an already overflowing parking lot at 9 a.m. Further up the road we found space at the Lyle Cherry Orchard Trail and started up the hill. I still don’t know where the cherry orchard was, but we were successful in our search for flowers.

Western Waterleaf
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Southwest 2020, Arizona

We headed across New Mexico on the very busy I-40, with a few side trips to see remnants of Route 66 and pick up a Frito pie for breakfast. By mid-morning we took the exit to the Petrified Forest National Park to have a look around. Even though we read about some lesser developed routes and trails we had difficulty finding them. It seems like the National Park Service wants to keep you on a short leash in this park. Still, we enjoyed the trees that have turned to rocks.

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Southwest 2020, New Mexico

After a restless night listening to the huskies bark and howl and Mancos State Park we were headed south to New Mexico. We scaled back our New Mexico plans dramatically due to closures, but in order to complete our circle of the southwest we did pass through the northwestern corner. One area on the list that we would be near was the Bisti/Di-Na-Zin wilderness. There are at least two main trailheads into the area and because of the short days we didn’t waste any time and went to the one closest to us, which I believe is generally described as the Di-Na-Zin side of the wilderness. While the Bisti side apparently features the hoodoos the area is famous for, the Di-Na-Zin side did not disappoint and it was a great place to wander for an afternoon.

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Continue ReadingSouthwest 2020, New Mexico