Return to the North California Coast, 2021

We started to narrow down the list of possibilities for an extended anniversary weekend. We’ve been to the top of Hager Mountain and out to the Lost Forest. What would it be this year? Choices are somewhat limited, and although we’d really like to check out a yurt in the mountains of Idaho that will have to wait for another year. How about the wildflower bloom in the California deserts? Well, you need some rain for that. A hike on the Olympic Peninsula? Sort of hard if the trailheads are closed. After lots of thinking and staring at the map we settled on the northern California Coast. We headed out on Friday and made it to the Smith River for our first night. Then it was off through the narrow band of the redwoods on the way to the coast.

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Chickahominy!, 2021

Well, it appears we hadn’t been to Chickahominy for a fishing visit since 2018. Thankfully this site serves as my collective memory on such things. We have stopped in for a night on our way to somewhere else, and enjoyed a close up visit by a great horned owl on one memorable night. This time around it just seemed like we needed to get out to do some spring fishing, and take the boat for one last ride before we parted ways. A sunny weekend and the waters of Chickahominy beckoned. We arrived right before sunset.

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Macks Canyon, 2021

We continued searching for signs of spring. If you don’t recall, it was blackbirds on the John Day River that kicked off our spring search, followed by a trip to the coast that revealed daffodils in bloom, and then a weekend in the Columbia River Gorge for some spring wildflowers. Spring is all around, you just have to get out and find some signs. This time around we were bound for the lower Deschutes river. What signs of spring would we find?

Hills taking on a shade of green, a sure sign of spring on the Deschutes
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