A Reason To Go Around The Bend

After traveling in southeastern Oregon last week and eastern Oregon this week, I can confidently say the only part of Oregon I like is the eastern third of the state.  From Hood River, east.  From Bend, east.  From Sisters, east.  From Klamath Falls, east.  The coast is beautiful, the higher elevation mountains are beautiful, but have you ever driven from Bend to Burns?  Oh.  My.  God.  Horrid.

We went from Bend to Burns to McDermitt, the can-you-even-call-it-a-town? town on the Oregon-Nevada state line.  I thought I wasn't going to make it out of the state without crying.  And then I had to drive through Nevada.  It was truly a slit-my-wrists moment.

And let me tell you, for a truck, Bend may as well be Manhattan.  No parking.  No truck stops.  No stores with easy access.  Nothing.  Not a damn thing.  We considered having dinner there but couldn't find a place to park.  And even if we wanted to eat in our truck, there wasn't a slice of land to pull into.  And for a small town, the traffic was insane.  WTF??

Usually, we have no problem finding a place to park, even if it means slipping in behind a grocery store or a Home Depot, but unless I completely missed something while I was scouring the aerial map, there wasn't a thing. 

Then I got kinda pissed.  You know, these communities need trucks to bring them all the shit they're buying, eating, selling, wearing, etc.  This is one of those places where a trucker gets all indignant and wants to boycott bringing goods to the town.  Where they write letters to heads of local government telling them they wouldn't exist without trucks.  I usually don't get all heated about that subject.

But in Bend?  That's exactly how I felt.  And I'm pretty sure I'll never go back.  And at the twenty-one cents a mile we have to pay for road tax while in the state, I'd rather stick to the coast. 



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2017: Resting In The Open Range
2016: Dinner On A Stick
2015: The Good Deeds Of Summer
2014: The Mountain Was Out
2013: Small Town Bullshit. Big City Nothing.
2012: She’s Political Coming And Going And Doesn’t Even Know It
2011: Old As She Was, She Still Missed Her Daddy Sometimes
2010: Crafty Little Bugger
2009: Beauty For A Buck
2008: What My Thoughts Sound Like When Left Uncensored And Ultimately, Formed Into Words
2007: New York Style
2006: I.H.O.P.G.
2005: Sorry, no post on this day.