2010 June 29th:
Mark:
We woke up about the same time this morning. We were greeted with clear skies but very cool air temperature (55°F). There was also a strong breeze coming in off the ocean.
We got up and readied ourselves for breakfast, but breakfast was sort of lame. I had some Tillamook Yogurt (marionberry) and an English muffin. With a little juice to wash it down, I went back to the room to pack.
Knowing that we were going to head inland and most likely warmer temperatures, I dressed in Heat Gear. I was a little chilly for the first hour or so but it did warm up. Once we were loaded up, we headed out of town and up a little road toward Agnes, Oregon. We arrived at a road that was posted with warnings about being a narrow single lane road with no trailers allowed. This sounded perfect to us. The road turned out to be great with almost no traffic and just about as winding a road as possible. The road went up the side of this mountain range and then it followed the ridge for many miles. The views were great and at one point the clouds were coming over the ridge and we were driving through a fog as the clouds rolled over to the other side of the mountain. This was quite a fantastic experience.
Once we were down from the mountain and in the valley, it only took us a couple of minutes and we were in Grants Pass, Oregon. We stopped for some lunch and then we drove up to Crater Lake. The drive to the park was beautiful but fast. When we were in the trees, we both seemed to feel like they were hypnotizing us and we were both getting drowsy. We stopped and took a break and the continued up to the park.
When we arrived we found out that the Rim road was closed because it wasn’t plowed yet. There was quite a bit of snow still and we ended up walking through it just to get over to the edge of the rim to see the lake. We got the passport stamped at the Visitor’s Center and we walked through the gift shop.
On the way back down the mountain, I pulled into a turn out that still had a bunch of snow in it. I thought that it would be fun to see if I could ride the bike through the snow. Well the front tire wasn’t moving very well and the back tire was throwing a rooster tail about twenty feet out the back. The snow was about a foot deep and I was able to negotiate through about ten feet of it. It actually took a lot longer than I thought and I figured that I would get stuck but if the front tire would have had a ski on it, I would have gone right through it. Niko was a little upset at me and wanted to shoot some video, but I wasn’t going to do it again. We were both laughing pretty hard the whole time. I’m sure that it looked pretty funny to all of those cars that happened to drive by at that very moment.
We went back to Grants Pass and found a place to stay. We unloaded the bikes and then cleaned up and walk to dinner. Dinner was fresh fish and pie for dessert. We walked back and then spent a few minutes in the hot tub.
Today was a great day and we rode 280 miles. We saw Crater Lake and we took that crazy and wonderful road. We had a wonderful dinner and a nice place to stay. Thank you, and Good Night.

Niko:
This morning was cold and sunny but dad was sure it’d warm up once we got away from the beach. We dressed in heat gear, with a t-shirt over it. I threw on my riding pants and headed to breakfast in hopes of snagging a Krispy Kreme Doughnut. Turns out the doughnuts the motel was boasting never showed up.
After eating a meager breakfast, we moseyed back and packed up our bikes to leave. Dad went up to complain to the front desk about the Wi-Fi not working, and the Krispy Kremes not arriving. A sort of false advertisement.
We took off and turned on the road to Agnes. The road was fairly curvy, and it slowly warmed, though I didn’t get quite comfortable yet. We stopped at a sign that spoke the embodiment of our trip. “Traveling on this road is not advised, narrow and sharp turns. Rough gravel sections are ahead. Trailers are not recommended!” We smiled and rode on.
The road up to bear camp overlook was fun, scenic, and full of squirrels with death wishes. The road would be empty, and suddenly two squirrels would run across the road in front of us. The gravel sections of the road were mild, and the road was only one lane wide for two directions of traffic. I would recommend that large trucks and trailers should leave it alone.
At the summit of bear camp overlook, the clouds were pouring over one side into the valley we came from. I was getting quite chilled now, and I figured it was because of the clouds coming over the hill. We rode down, off the road, and into Grant’s Pass.
We decided to stop at Carl’s Jr. for a burger to make up for our lack of protein. The girl working there was friendly and cute too. I found out that my CamelBak had leaked all over my groin, and was making me cold on the way down the hill. We checked the map and got back on the bikes.
We continued riding, and riding towards Crater Lake. Shortly after we passed Gold Hill, we both were getting a bit droopy eyed, so we stopped about 15 minutes shy of Crater Lake and had ice cream. We continued on to the entrance, and found out that the road that goes all the way around the rim was closed.
Bummer. We were looking forward to going around Rim drive, but settled for some hiking between visitor centers.
We headed back down the mountain to Gold Hill to see the mystery house at Oregon Vortex. Dad stopped at a turn off on the mountain that had a large 6 inch deep pile of snow, and slowly sprayed his way through. I was cursing myself for not turning on the camera for it.
When we arrived back in gold hill, we got lost looking for the mystery house by following directions. Signs said turn right, but they meant turn left. The vortex closed at 5, and it was a quarter to 6. So we just moved on.
We rode back to Grants Pass and settled into a La Quinta Inn. We unpacked, dad took a shower and then we walked down to a local diner for fish, cornbread, soup, and Oreo pie. We walked back to the hotel and did a few things on the laptop and went to the hot tub.
I stayed there for an hour after dad left to work on the blog (Probably longer than I should have). I came back to the room as dad was finishing up his blog, and started mine. I’m tired now, my eyes sting a bit, and dad’s occasional snores are making me want to sleep.
Thank you for reading, goodnight! 1:00 here.