After the hike, and our reasonably late night, we wake a little later than usual. My companion has decided he needs a haircut, so as he heads off I wait in a nice little coffee shop for a while although I’m still unable to secure a flat white. With one of our party neatly and newly shorn, we continue on towards Portland, which is a fair drive from Bend and we’re hoping to stop for a hike on the way. We stop for some lunch on the way out - I did say it was a late start - and move out into the countryside around Bend, which is pretty incredible.
Suddenly we seem to have left the mountains behind, and we’re now in the wide, open valleys between the peaks. We see tumbleweeds rolling across the highway, something I’ve seen before but that always makes me feel like we’re in some sort of western movie, snowy plains and deep canyons, where angled basalt columns look like they’ve been hammered into the ground. The snow starts to creep back as we head back into the mountain passes, with fresh drifts visible alongside the road and a steady stream of snow falling as we approach the Frog Butte trailhead.
The snow is really coming down as we get our gear ready, including my new snowshoes this time, and we meet a man who’s just returning with his two dogs as we start the trail - he gives us a mild warning about backcountry shoeing but we pay him little heed and head off. The initial start to the track is a pretty much entirely uphill road, with nicely compacted snow that makes the going a bit easier than the last hike we tried. We continue up, and whilst it’s a bracing journey, the heavy snow clouds limit what we can see across the valleys.
Eventually, we reach the turning for Frog Butte (I’m not attempting to be funny here, a butte is a tall, flat-topped tower of rock), which reveals itself to be an untrodden path into deep snow. Again. Using myself as a sort of pathfinder, we make our way as best we can, trying to find purchase in the snow but inevitably failing at points. The going is again slow, but steady and after another hour or so we find ourselves facing a massive radio antenna, the surrounding fence of which is barely visible in the drifts, but is a sure sign that we’ve reached our first peak of the trip. We celebrate by adding another layer to our clothing, as the wind is bitter and biting, before heading back down through the forest to the road and our car. We’ve been out for quite a while, almost three and a half hours, so we set back out as the sun is starting to go down.
The journey to Portland was pretty intense, with snow constantly sleeting down as the day;ought started of ebb away. The roads are covered with slushy, melting ice and there are a significant amount of signs warning of the need for snow chains in the event of bad weather (which we do not have, given we collected our car in California). Thankfully, the journey into Portland is pretty uneventful although we don’t find space in our chosen hotel - we wanted to stay in another of the McMenamins properties, a cool looking tricorner building in central Portland, but they’re fully booked. We ‘make do’ with the `Ace Hotel’ a few blocks away, which is delightfully hipster if not overly large or practical - the woollen blankets on the beds can be bought for only $450, so it much be good.
We get showered and changed and head out into the city - as you might have gathered, these trips tend not to focus on city dwelling but we’re happy to give it a go once in a while. Portland is the home of grunge and is renowned for being quite an eclectic place, who we head out for dinner at 10 Barrel Brewery, a local place serving pretty good food and on-site brewed beers. After filling up, we try a few bars, but the mood is decidedly subdued - the barman at the Teardop tells us that Portland has been hit pretty hard during the pandemic and many people are still wary, hence the quieter-than-usual nightlife. He points us in the direction of a couple of places, which require an Uber to get to, and appear to be equally dead. We end up at a very peculiar bar, called the Goodfoot, which seems to offer pool, pinball and music to a group of almost entirely student customer. It’s fun, but odd, and we head home just after 1AM more than a little confused.