August 15, 2017
Weed to Malheur National Forest
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382 miles
8.8 mpg
Awake @ 3:40, up @ 4:30, gone by 5:00
There were some serious climbs on this leg. Check out the mileage I was getting...
We had spoken with the Forest Ranger about where we might drag a 38-foot 5th wheel to disperse camp. We checked out the area on Google Earth and I placed a GPS waypoint at a prospective spot right on the exact center of the eclipse path of totality. When we got there, it was a small clearing just off highway 18, across from the turnoff to go down to Lake Magone (pronounced: mah-goon!) We pulled over and I got the motorcycle out to explore and perhaps find a good spot to camp. We saw the ranger take the turnoff down to the lake, so I drove the 3 miles down to the lake. It's a paved, narrow, 1-lane, twisty road with frequent turnouts for passing. I caught up with the ranger as he was talking with the campground hosts. The campground filled up the day before. The ranger said it would be fine to camp where we were as long as we weren't blocking the forestry road and we weren't parked on any tall dry grasses. SOLD! So I drove back to the trailer and we set up such that we hope to be able to get out Monday after the eclipse. We'll see!
Here's our "camp". The turnoff down to the lake can be seen off the upper right corner of the rig. Highway 18 turns from asphalt to "improved gravel road" at the far right of the picture, at those yellow posts. We hope to escape that direction Monday after the big event. It's 13.6 miles of "improved gravel", then another 6.4 miles of asphalt out to highway 395 at Long Creek.
Here's the view out our kitchen window, not bad, eh? ...
After setting up we decided to go check out the town of Prairie City. Cool little town, one main street with a dozen or so shops. Stopped in a shop and found a Resistol hat in my size for 20% off - sold! Then we went to the market and got some Irish Spring soap to put under the truck hood to repel the critters which will chew up insulation and wiring! And of course some ice cream for the drive back to camp - Moose Tracks, just like at Yellowstone last year with Jim & Peggy.
We found the Ranger station but it was closed - tomorrow.
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