Touring Southern Oregon
/Day 1 - Traveling from Bend
Leave highway 97 in La Pine heading into the Oregon Outback (insert photo) on highway 31.
We took an 8 mile detour off highway 31 to go into the little town of Fort Rock, Dave’s family homestead. (insert photos of Fort Rock) There is a great little homesteading museum there, but has limited times to be open. Check times at the Homestead Village Museum website. Even when the museum in closed, you can get some great photos of some historic buildings and farm equipment. There is a picnic area near the rock, but we didn’t take the time to drive out to it.
Along the way to Lakeview, we drove past Summer Lake. It was pretty startling to see what appeared to be steam rising up off the lake. This lake is very shallow and dries out every summer. When the wind kicks up, alkali particles and other minerals float up into the air. This is what looked like steam to us.
The next town we came to was Paisley. It’s a cute little (very little) town. We did grab a burger at the Homestead Café. I must say, it was quite good.
The town of Lakeview is small, but does have an older Safeway (no hot/cold food deli or Starbucks), a couple of restaurants, as well as several hotels; oh, yes, a gas station too. We stayed at the Freemont Hotel and at Hunter’s Hot Springs Resort.
Freemont Hotel (insert photos)
The Freemont Hotel seems to have formerly been a senior assisted living facility. All of the rooms are studio apartments with kitchenettes minus a cook top. They come complete with dishes and an apartment size refrigerator.
Breakfast in the morning consists of scrambled eggs, fried potatoes, sausage and/or bacon, biscuits with gravy, waffles as well as the usual continental options of breads, yogurts, and cereals.
Day 2 – off to the mines
We left Lakeview and headed toward Plush, Oregon. We stopped at the one store in Plush mostly because we were curious about what it looked like and I wanted an opportunity to use a flushing toilet before getting to the mines where I’d been told the only bathrooms were hiding behind the sage brush. The store was very…well…rustic. They do offer a hot deli (menu items along the lines of corn dogs…).
Next stop, Spectrum Mine. The road to the mine can be very rough. It’s recommended that you have a full tank of gas and good tires on your car. Apparently there have been many punctured tires this year due to sharp rocks. Honestly, we didn’t find the roads to be that bad. We did have to travel slowly over the gravel roads mostly due to me having a new car and Dave new that I’d be quite mad if my new car suffered a rock chip.
We took the off road scenic route into the mine mostly because we missed a sign somewhere. Look for the American flag flying. The person that helped us at the mine was very friendly and helpful. We decided to first dig and the free area to get the feel of what to expect. After an hour or so, we decided to buy a bag of stones that were mined from an area known to have larger and better quality sunstones. It didn’t disappoint. Within minutes we had several very large nice gems, supposedly enough to pay for our bag of stones. We have yet to know if this is true. I’ll follow up and let you know.
Be prepared to get very dirty at the mine. It is very dusty there. Also, there are no bathrooms or any type of amenities there so come prepared. It was in the low 70s and I got plenty hot so you might also keep that in mind. I sure wouldn’t want to be there on a hot day.
Not far from Spectrum is a BLM area where you are allowed to camp at no charge. There are bathrooms (outhouses) there as well as covered picnic tables. You can also dig for gemstones on the BLM land.
There are other mines near spectrum, but we didn’t check them out. Mostly because you had to pay to dig and/or pay if you got any good stones. If I found it, I wanted to be able to keep it.
Hunter’s Hot Springs Resort (insert photos)
Hunter’s Hot Springs Resort is an older facility, but it’s alright. The big claim that they have is a very nice mineral hot spring swimming pool. The pool is nice. To call this place a resort is a big stretch. To be fair, I’ve only seen it at night, but I don’t think the daytime view is going to change my opinion much. I’ll take photos and you can decide for yourself. It was half the price of Freemont though.
Well, the morning light did little to change my opinion, but here are some photos. You can decide for yourself. As far as Dave and I though, we would go back. We enjoyed the low price and the hot spring pool.
Lakeview to Bandon –
Yes, it’s a LONG drive. There are so many nice places to stop in between, but we had another engagement in Bandon and so we just stayed on the road stopping only to capture an occasional photo.
Some great places to stop along the way:
- Crater Lake - views
- Diamond Lake – views, boat/kayak rentals, fishing, restaurant, small store/gift shop
- Klamath Falls – bird watching and gorgeous waterways
- Northern California (see some of the Redwood Trees)
- Brookings to Gold Beach (Often you can see a large herd of Elk. Also, the ocean views are very pretty)
- Gold Beach (jet boats into the wilderness area – view many different animals even bears)
- Sunset hotel – Bandon, Oregon
We splurged and reserved an ocean front (not ocean view) room for two nights. We go lucky because a big storm with a high surf advisory is in effect. We plan on going to Shore Acres Park tomorrow in hopes of capturing some of those huge waves.