Oregon Outback Day 3 1/2-A Rock That Was Never a Fort, and the Infamous Red Sauce Forest

Neither Sam or I got hit by sprinklers last night. In fact the zone where our tents were had not even come on before I left! Since Sam wasn’t quite ready to roll yet, I asked him to make sure and uncover the sprinkler head before he left. We took selfies. 

I didn’t mention it last night, but he is close to having ridden 3000 miles on this tour! What an adventure!

On my way out, I finally remembered to dump my trash (at a gas station). Food bags are getting lighter. That’s a good thing because for these next two days (roughly 80 miles), there is no water. Since it’s also quite toasty, I opted to carry my maximum capacity of 9 liters + 24ozs. I will blame my slow riding on the water weight (because otherwise I’d be super fast…okay…maybe not).

First destination for today was Fort Rock. It was about 16 miles from Silver Lake. Most of it was gravel.

That’s the rock in the distance. 

 Fort Rock is a very small town. There is a museum that is supposed to be pretty cool, but it didn’t open until 11:00.

Part of the museum collection. 

Info signs were available on the outside of the fence. 

Fort Rock from the museum. See the tiny white building on the right side, near the base of the rock? That’s the State Park. I was heading there next.

At the State Park. Some info about the geology of the rock and surrounding area. Fort Rock used to be a volcanic island in a giant lake. 

According to this, Fort Rock was never used as an actual fortress in real battles. You can see why people might think that. There are hiking trails but I wasn’t interested (too hot, inappropriate footwear, and snake potential…which do you think is the number one reason?).

While I was at the park, I filled up my Be Free 1 liter filter bag (supposedly, the water is not potable), and drank a whole liter. Then I filled it up again, and put it in my framebag. With over 20 lbs of water, I poodled out from the park…yes, poodled!

Next destination was the section they call the “Red Sauce Forest”. On my way there I spotted today’s wildlife. 

Seven Antelope. At first they were running away. When I stopped, they stopped. Then some came for a closer look. 

It was about 9 miles of wide open gravel riding to get to the Deschutes National Forest. 

The Forest is the line of trees in front of those hills. 

Once I got to the trees, I found a spot to eat some lunch. 

I was trying to figure out if the whole forest section is the “Red Sauce Forest”, or just a part. I’ve seen photos, and this part above doesn’t look as red as in the photos. However, it was often quite “saucy” dirt/sand at times. 
This was later on. It looked a little more red. This was also the only climb that initiated the climb profile today. It wasn’t very steep, or even very long (1.8 miles), but it was saucy, and slow going. I would ride from shady spot to shady spot, because it was also very warm (some might even say hot!).

Of course this is all a volcanic area geologically. There were some sections of lava rock. 

This area is a big OHV area too. There are numerous trails and side roads. This being the beginning of the holiday weekend, there were also a lot of ATVs, and a handful of dirt bikes. They don’t really slow down, and they kick up a crap ton of dust. As soon as I saw them coming, I’d pull my Buff up over my nose and mouth. Some of the pickups/cars that went by slowed down. 

At about 4:00, I had gone a little over 44 miles. I saw a nice flat spot off the road. I told Billy we were home for the night. My elevation gain for today was only 1581feet. It seemed like more, especially because my average speed was only 7.1mph. 

That’s home!