Bend and Silverton, OR

Saturday, July 4

About mid-afternoon we got to Scandia RV Park just outside of Bend.  Nothing special, and our spot was a bit small, but we had full hookups.  We took an Uber into downtown Bend and tried to hit Deschutes Brewery, but there was an hour wait, and it didn’t look like they had any outdoor seating.  So, we wandered over to Bend Brewing Company.  They had a very pretty lawn overlooking the Deschutes River, and we were able to get a table in about 10 minutes.  Ordered some soft pretzels with beer cheese (SO good!) fries, and beer while HB and K had some free Sprites.  Weather was perfect – mid 70s and sunny.  

We then wandered down the road along the river and looked for a spot for dinner.  Barrio was closed for the 4^th, but we found 5 Fusion, a good sushi and Fusion spot.  Ordered some edmame, several rolls and P ordered the Pork Yakitori appetizer for her entrée, and it was SUPER small (about 2 bites), so she ended up ordering the Korean Fried Chicken to go with it.  Everything was very tasty!

We then wandered through town, found an ice cream spot – Goody’s (which was very good – Kacie ordered the Cookie Monster in a waffle cone – it was blue, but very good!) – and then scoped out a spot to watch the fireworks.  We found a parking garage with an open top floor, which had a great view of Pilot Butte.  Fireworks were great, but not as fancy as watching them on the Esplanade with the Boston Pops playing in the background .  

Sunday, July 5

Slept in a bit and then headed to Sun Country Tours for The Big Eddy Thriller rafting trip at 10:30.  Clint was our tour guide, and he was great.  He told us winter is his favorite time in Bend.  Mount Bachelor is only 20 minutes away and has great snow boarding and skiing.  The rafting trip itself was SO MUCH FUN!  We hit several big rapids and got pretty soaked!  Water was a bit chilly, but not as ice cold as we all had feared.  Nobody fell out, so it was a success!

After rafting, we went into downtown Bend and grabbed lunch from Super Burrito.  Great, inexpensive burritos, tacos and nachos!  Sat outside on their patio, sun shining and about 72 degrees.  We then grabbed some cute Tshirts from Cascade Cottons (highly recommend – they had some really cute stuff), and wandered over to MacKay Park.  Clint told us about surfing you can do on the river at MacKay and we wanted to check it out in person.  There were a bunch of people tubing down the river and several surfing on a man-made wave in the river.  So cool!  If you want to tube here, though, you have to provide your own tube.  They don't rent them on the river.  We all wished we had another night to spend in Bend!  But, alas, we were off to Silverton, OR in Willamette Valley.  Drove through Willamette National Forest, which was beautiful - huge evergreen trees that made us feel like we were a tiny toy car driving through a giant forest.  Then on the other side of Willamette National Forest was a great expanse of flat farmland - very different from the forest we had just driven through.

We stopped at Silver Falls State Park and hiked part of the 10 falls loop. We started at the Winter Falls trailhead and hiked 1.2 miles to Double Falls.  We passed Winter Falls, Drake Falls, Middle North Falls (where we could walk behind the waterfall), and then finally to Double Falls.  We turned around after Double Falls since it was getting late and Kacie did not want to go on a long hike. The entire loop felt like we were walking through a rainforest - tons of trees and moss, and it was shady and cool and damp. This hike was beautiful, and highly recommended if you are in the area!

We finally made our way to Silver Spur RV Park and had a late dinner of burgers and Caesar salad.  Unfortunately, our spot did not come with our own fire pit / grill, so we just made burgers on the cooktop. RV Park was fine, but not the best one of the trip.  We watched some of Hamilton on Disney Plus while Merrie did a load of laundry and then went to bed.