Central Oregon is likely to always remain connected in my mind to a video game for Playstation called Days Gone. That’s because it was created by Bend Studios (located in Bend, Oregon) and uses actual locations in Oregon for the game map. Moreover, the main character in the game is a biker riding around a zombie filled, post apocalyptic Oregon, mostly avoiding cities by lurking in the forests, camps, and resorts of central Oregon.
The game “Days Gone” features a biker who survived a zombie apocalypse and lives in Central Oregon about two years after the fall, working as a vigilante. Playing the game has given me a lot of deja vu while traveling through Central Oregon.
That fits in with me: a guy riding a motorcycle and camping throughout the US, except I’m trying to avoid the meth-zombies that choke the bigger cities and lurk around the fringes. The first step to getting to central Oregon though was to head south, to the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum — home of the Spruce Goose.
It was the perfect way to cap off this year’s trip, which became an aviation-themed exploration due to the Mars water bomber’s retirement. And, while Mars is the largest flying boat to enter production, the prototype of the H4 Hercules is the largest flying boat ever to fly. No, the plane was never officially called “Spruce Goose:” that was an insulting moniker the plane’s detractors in the media put on it. It was officially named the Hercules.
In fact, the big plane is made of birch, not spruce wood. Technically is was a composite called Duramold© but this isn’t a technical analysis of building materials. And really, I don;t need to rehash the story of the plane — just Google it if you’re interested. I can say, however, the plane lived its life and most of its retirement in the Long Beach harbor, about 30-40min away from where I grew up.
My father never took me to see it as a kid, and it eventually lost its lease and was moved up to Oregon, where it became the crown jewel of Evergreen’s exhibits. And yes, it’s huge. It’s so damn big you can’t really grasp it. Similar to Mars, you have to stand really far back to see the whole thing, and the Goose is indoors so you can’t really do that. Also, it is so big that its eight engines (the Mars has four) look tiny and trick the eye into thinking the plane is smaller.
I can say with certainty that I can’t imagine it moving at the 90mph required for it to take to the air, which it did in its one and only test flight of only about 3/4mi. Inside the plane it’s also confusing, as the technology of the late-1940’s means the plane has less interior space than other cargo planes I’ve been inside, including ones that have a shorter fuselage. So much space is needed for mechanical parts that there is an entire lower deck of hydraulics and fuel tanks and pumps.
Interior view looking aft. Not as cavernous as other planes of the same size, but this was designed in the 1940’s after all.
But all said and done the thing is a marvel even by today’s standards. The largest cargo plane in the world today, the Antonov AN-124, is longer by a significant amount but has a shorter wingspan. Imagine that people could make a plane of similar size, using piston engines to power it and building it all out of wood, in the 1940’s.
The rest of the museum is stunning as well. Many of the planes are replicas, which are always a little weird because they look real at first, but as I looked closer the little details looked wrong. When I go to see something that is decades old, those little details are usually what stand out in my memory. I can look at 3D renderings or drawings and get the same sense as a full-scale replica.
This F-4 Phantom retired from the Oregon Air National Guard but while in the Navy it shot down two enemy fighter planes over Vietnam. As fighter planes go it is a large aircraft, but look at the Spruce Goose in the background.
How designers solved simple problems like adding steps for the pilot to climb in or access panels so mechanics can check tire pressures…those are the things you don’t see in a drawing, or a replica. It’s less of a problem with replicas of spaceships and satellites, since the real ones have a similar look to replicas (there are way fewer panels to access for servicing, as there is no one in space to perform service on a satellite), but even those are misleading when you start looking closely.
Into the central realm
After the museum I was free in a sense. I’m always “free” in that I don’t have a 9-5 job to report to, but this trip was focused on seeing air museums and culminating with seeing the Goose. Now the only goal was to return to Bisbee and figure out winter hibernation plans.
But of course I wanted to explore some of Central Oregon. The only other time I had been there before was on a 2020 trip with my then-girlfriend, and now I had the ability to explore without constantly having to please her on top of things (well, more like those other things were on top of pleasing her, in hindsight). I didn’t get to do the amount of hiking I wanted (a lot of the places you go in the video game are hiking trails not open to motor vehicles), but I did get to explore some of the small towns and roads featured in Days Gone.
I took Hwy 22 out of the farmland and into the mountains where it met Hwy 20 at Santiam Junction. While the town of Sisters is left out of the game for some reason, it is the only town of size in the area northwest of Bend. That’s where I found camping at a USFS site called Cold Springs.
True to its name there was a spring there, and the water was very cold. But hey, since the water was coming right out of the ground you could actually drink it safely, and the water pump in camp had been shut off for the impending winter freezes.
I spent three nights there and went exploring video game locations just for the hell of it on my first full day. Camp Sherman is a very small town, more like a cluster of summer homes with a store and a campground and some trails. It looked nothing like the video game location but that wasn’t the point. I grabbed some postcards and a soda, then spent some time watching the Metolius River flow by, its headwaters only about a mile away.
After that I back-tracked to Santiam Junction where I could pick up Hwy 126 south. The trees are mostly conifers in the area, but the evergreen blanket just made the yellowing leaves contrast that must more as I rode south on what was originally the wagon road connecting the Oregon coast to the rest of the country.
Along that stretch is the Fish Lake Remount area, used by the Parks Department even today, but it was once even more important. Because the highway and wagon road are so close to each other in that spot, the buildings are used as a headquarters for US Forestry, but they were originally part of an important stopover for travelers.
View from the porch. Must have been a good way to unwind after work.
It had a hotel and livery, saloon and mechanics shop, and was a launch point for search and rescue for travelers in trouble along the route. It was at the shore of Fish Lake, but the lake only fills in the winter when ice backs up the waters and they backflow into what is an open meadow the rest of the year.
I enjoyed standing on the porch of a 1905 building and staring out into that meadow. I could not only look back in time and wonder what it felt like to sit there after a hard day’s work, but could also reach into the future and wonder what that meadow looks like when it becomes a lake.
Further south, near Belknap Springs (also featured in Days Gone), Hwy 242 turns back toward Sisters, and proved to be the absolute best stretch of road I’ve hit all year. In the area of hand-cutting roadways and using horse-drawn scrapers to try and level them, it was much easier for a road to twist and turn along the terrain than to remove thousands of tons of earth to cut a straight line.
Curves may lower speeds, but in that era horses did the pulling and it was better to have less of a grade and more turns; no one wants horses running for their lives to avoid being crushed by an overloaded wagon, especially the people riding in the wagon. In the era of motorcycles, these are the roads we week.
They interact with the terrain, much how ambient noise becomes music as soon as there is a beat. As the road disappears around a bend my peripheral vision sees the terrain around it, allowing me to predict what the other half of the corner looks like. Guess right and you rocket out of the corner at full throttle and prepare to attack the next bend. Get it wrong and, well, things go bad really quick.
The pavement was new — solid black with fresh paint. There was still loose gravel from previous rains, but that is another thing that can be predicted by experience. I kept the speeds down though, mainly because the Chieftain is not particularly fun when you push it hard. It can arc through corners with grace considering its size, but when you push it like a sport bike the soft suspension reminds you it is designed for comfort and not cornering.
I enjoyed the movement through time and space, but the sun was getting too low for me to take the hike out to Belknap Crater like I had planned. I was still able to stop near the summit of MacKinze pass, where the grave of John Templeton Craig lies. This real-life roadside marker is actually featured in the Days Gone video game: a dedication to Craig, the Pioneer Mailman.
He was a fella in his early 50’s and walked the pass as part of his mail route. Caught in a sudden storm in the late 1800’s, he holed up in a derelict cabin, but it wasn’t enough to ward off hypothermia. A search party found him frozen to death the next day. He was buried at the site and it became a landmark for travelers.
The forests then begin to share space with massive rock beds that were once lava flows. The eruptions were so long ago that the fields look like black lava rock from a distance, but on closer inspection they are sort of in between the air-filled lava rocks we think of and solid stone. This planet operated on an entirely different time scale than mammals.
In one of these lava beds is the Dee Wright Observatory. It was a New Deal project, designed to put people to work during the Depression. It’s a round stone structure with bricks removed to make small eye-ports. They aim straight out to one of the many mountains in all directions: Mount Jefferson, North and South Sister, Mount Washington, etc.
I was there at the golden hour and spent quite some time in the biting wind, looking near and far in all directions. The lava bed showed a stillness and wonder while also being the result of destruction 40,000 years ago, juxtaposing the extremes of ugliness and beauty. The mountains in the distance offered majesty but also showed their indifference to living things as the thick clouds swirled around their snowy slopes. The sun gave way to the dark as the gold went to gray.
It was now “deer-thirty,” the gray hour that conceals movement and shallows the sense of three-dimension as we try to drive. Deer are also happy in this light, as they are best hidden from predators but still have light to see by. Sure enough, while following some road-zombie in an SUV (who refused to use the turnouts) we came around a corner to about five doe standing in the roadway.
Yes, in the grayness there are several deer: two in the road and three going up the hillside. There are many reasons not to pass on a double-yellow, even when you can see far enough. It takes experience and timing and a little luck to do it right, so it better be worth it when you do.
Experience had prepared me so I already had my fingers on the brake lever, turning potential disaster into a minor disturbance. It was excuse enough though for me to blast past the car without concern for the double-yellow lines. Fact is, I try to stay at least close to the law, but I’m not risking my ass because some traffic engineer decided to paint a line somewhere; safer to pass when it’s clear for a motorcycle to do so than to stop and wait for the slower vehicle to get ahead.
Once around I could flip on the high beams, which don’t help a huge amount in the gray hour, but they reflect of eyeballs and that can be the difference between a collision or not; at the least it’s the difference between a collision you see coming and being blindsided. Fortunately the twisty (but stunning) ride down through the lava bed ended before it good too dark, and I was back to camp via a straight piece of road.
Sisters finale and further south
The next day’s ride was cut short. I heard something unusually loud from the back of the bike. It was hard to detect, but it wasn’t there before. Sure enough, upon checking the drive belt (most cruiser-style motorcycles do not use a chain, but a Kevlar toothed-belt to drive the rear wheel) I found it was extremely loose. On the good side, it wasn’t dangerously loose, just well out of spec.
To adjust the drive belt the rear wheel must be off the ground. To lift the rear of the bike with a jack there is only one safe point. The center of gravity is so far back you either need to remove the saddlebags, or find a counterweight like I did here, with a campside stone.
I was able to cruise into town and get a small bottle jack to lift the rear wheel off the ground, and a deep-well socket to adjust the belt’s tension. It took some tap-dancing to actually get the bike to balance on the jack, but I was able to adjust things and still had enough daylight to go explore Sisters.
I grabbed food at the Hard Tails Saloon, a biker bar devoid of bikers at the moment. It looked like the right type of place though, with a small stage, pool tables, American food on the menu, and an outdoor area for smokin’ and drinkin’. Honestly the biker scene doesn’t really fit for me, feeling a bit one-dimensional. I don’t have fancy tastes, but my tastes aren’t as simple as a burger n’ beer and some 70’s rock on the speakers.
The food was goof though and the place uncrowded, so I ate and roamed around the town. They should thank the landscape designer for the newer developments, because they picked a lot of majestic trees that turn deep red before shedding their leaves.
Supposedly the town of Sisters wasn’t used in Days Gone, but many of the buildings were. I did notice the vibe felt like the game, but couldn’t see any specific buildings that reminded me of specific buildings in the game. That’d make sense, what with the game having a huge map with the deepest detail reserved for buildings you have specific missions in.
Final stop
The push south was on, and there were only a few stops I planned on. Many things had already closed Sept 1st, and the places from Days Gone were more general things like towns used, not specific spots. I did stop in Tumalo though, as there is a 120-year-old church that was used as inspiration for an in-game church.
I saw the resemblance, but could say the same about 100’s of churches build in that era. One funny thing was that next door was a clubhouse for the Mongols MC, one of the “big five” biker clubs in the US. The character in Days Gone is a member of a fictional club called the Mongrels, and I wonder if the game designers picked a name that sounded similar to the Mongols after seeing that clubhouse while out scouting.
Personally I don’t see the resemblance. Or, what I see is it resembling a hundred different churches I’ve seen.
Nearby was a food truck court, so I grabbed tacos and beer. Now, these were good tacos mind you — Dr.Pepper marinated asada with picked onions and other toppings — but NO TACO IS WORTH $6.00. I find it genuinely insulting that people want to take simple street food and “elevate” it so they can upcharge. The tacos I get for $2-3 at food trucks in California are as good or superior, and down in Mexico they are $0.75-$1.75.
Moving south on Hwy 97 I was able to make good time, which was good as the scenery is mostly conifers on both sides of the road blocking the view. I did make a stop in Bend, but since I don’t much care for towns and I had been to Bend already, I only stopped long enough to see an archeological treasure: the last Blockbuster Video on Earth:
At Sunriver I swapped the highway for the 2-lane, fueled up, and worked out toward Davis Lake. Though it was still tree-lined, the road undulated enough to give some views, and the undulations also meant I was climbing into the mountains, where there are more views because of more clearings, and more lava beds of course.
The Lava Flow Campground is a primitive set up with only 3-4 sites and a pit toilet. It is next to a lava bed that was probably 6-stories high and abutted the campsites and lakeside like it was man-made. The sun set over Maiden Peak and I watch the oranges go red, then blue-gray, into gray. The water was still, even as a single canoe paddled along it.
I boiled spiral pasta and through in some alfredo sauce and a can of tuna, surprising myself how good it tasted after adding a touch of garlic powder and black pepper. Maybe I was just starving because $12 of tacos isn’t as filling as it used to be. It made me look forward to moving further south though, to the land of the “proper” taco.
In the morning I rode south, hit up Chemult for some photos of buildings used in Days Gone, and went straight toward Klamath Falls. I was surprised to find out that I knew two people in town, as I thought both of them lived in the general area, but hundreds of miles away. I also knew both of them from two different phases of my life.
From the video game Days Gone.
The actual KJ’s Cafe in Chemult.
John Krueger was on a Veterans Charity Ride last year, so we had motorcycling and the military in common. My other friend, Charles Rancouer, I met while taking community college classes. He actually started riding motorcycles partly because of me, so we had that and an interest in agriculture in common.
It was great catching up with them, but it was especially interesting seeing Charles because it had been over a decade. He was a kid in his early 20’s, and now he was in his 30’s and had actually put together a life; raising a kid, finding a proper job and not just some mindless 9-5, buying a house…it was all “real adult” stuff. Heck, they were things I had done but don’t do anymore these days, so he seemed even more put together than I do! Pretty cool to see him make it out of the mess that is Victorville, California. It eats young people for a snack.
I also went to Sunday dinner with John and his family, who are in the area. It was a great moment to remember that traditional concept of “home” and “family.” They all lived nearby but could easily have their separate lives, but still come together for a simply meal every week. I chatted about my travels and my own struggle to find a sense of community, meaning, and purpose while out on the road.
I don’t need to wax on the topic again just now, but it is an overriding theme to the last four years. I had people who treated me as important decide I was no longer important to them. I had things that were important to me that ceased to have importance. In all of that change I still haven’t yet redefined external things that matter to me.
It isn’t easy to not blink during a 30 second exposure, so it’s impressive I got this selfie to come out at all.
Final thoughts
Partly I don’t want people to be close to me, as I’ve simply had to many instances where I put more into a relationship than I’ve received, i.e. I’m sick of being used. Part of it is that I’ve lost interest in the things I was once passionate about. Music chewed me up and spat me out enough. Racing gave me a lot but took so much sustained effort that it upset the rest of my life. While traveling and writing still interest me, they are both done without a defined purpose: there is no meaning to it.
The upshot is that I am okay with the wandering. Much of it has been wandering away from life, but for the past year or two I have been wandering toward a life. I could actually define that, but this is a public blog and quite honestly, I don’t know you like that. I’ll save it for my book: that will get enough revision that it’ll be alright to publish. I don’t even proof-read blog posts (as you can tell from the grammar errors), and my hard-earned, deep understanding about running toward or away from life is a multi-layered concept.
This blog has space for multi-layered concepts, but not in this post. This is an update to my travels. From Klamath Falls I worked south into California, then into Nevada, where I swapped out a few items from my storage unit. I over-nighted in South Tahoe because there’s a hostel there that costs about what a private campground does, but it was clearly party-night for the other guests, and I got ZERO sleep.
I made it to the Bay Area though and need to try and make the most of these days. I would like to see the final resting spot for my cat, but I also don’t need it, as I said goodby the last time I actually saw the guy. I’ve got to swing through the VA hospital and jump through some hoops. I did want to also stop at another famous grave, since the Bay is swarming them and I always seem to find a new one.
Nothing is mandatory except for the VA, and I’ve got no real timeframe for my ride back to Bisbee. It’s almost 1,000mi exactly taking the most direct route, but that would involve my great nemesis: Interstate 5. I also don’t need to take weeks to make a two-day ride. I am “traveled out” and in a numb state as far as seeing new sights.
Better to get into “hunker down” mode and work on the neglected things, avoiding the mental atrophy that can come from being locked up in a place alone all winter. I’m getting better at this version of being alive, still in “the search,” but comfortable with the fact, and thankful for the fact I even have the opportunity to continue “the search” instead of settling for people that don’t appreciate me and jobs that don’t fulfill me — or even paying me enough to take a decent vacation.
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Johnny Killmore 