Oregon

    My brother Adam and I have been touring around Oregon.  Our first stop was Ashland, a little college town full of artsy theatre hippies.  On our way through northern Cali we saw Mt. Shasta, like the huge gaurdian of the Sacramento Valley.  We camped one night there, then drove into Oregon the next day.

  Once in Ashland, we hiked around Lithia Park, which has an amazing trail system leading out of town up Ashland Creek, a cold brook flowing down from the mountains.

    We swam here a few times to cool off in the afternoons. 

 Ashland had a solid skate park.

Someone tried to road bike the ramps...

This man was painted in gold and reading Shakespeare quotes on the street.

Hiking up the mountain out of Ashland, we found cool biking/hiking trails.

  There was a jump over a pit.

Up the road from Ashland was a little town called Talent, which had a neat park.



We left Ashland via a back road Adam remembered from his visit here years ago.  In this picture is Mt. Ashland, the ski area close by.

    On the way to the hot springs we saw Mt. Thielson, a needle like mountain.



    We stopped at a few waterfalls. Oregon is full of streams and rivers, and very green.  Moss covers almost everything in these forests.

    We arrived at Umpqua hot springs, a volcanic spring that is said to have been a sacred healing place for the Native Americans.  Little pools carved out of the soft rock collect hot mineral water that stains orange and green.

All up and down the Umpqua River were beautiful spots.  Even some longboarding roads.

Monkeying around at Tokatee Falls. 

Our campsite at Umpqua.  I want you! to go camping.

 

This leaking aquaduct was the local car wash...

    After leaving the Umpqua, we drove past Lemolo Lake on our way to Cougar hot springs.

We tooled around the back roads almost the whole time.  This one was inpassable.

This is another beautiful lake we drove by.  Windy and chilly up there, and noone around.

The drive from Oakridge to Cougar Resevoir was an amazing mix of turny back roads and scenic Oregon river valleys.

We arrived at Cougar Reevoir after dark and camped.  After a chilly night we awoke to an amazing sunrise and then went soaking in the mystical Cougar hot springs.

Hot water poured out of a cave, steaming and full of minerals, into very clean pools.

THANKS FOR LOOKING!  LOVE FROM THE CHASE BOYS.  KEEP ON MOVING!