Steens Mountain

I'd never heard of Steens Mountain Wilderness the day before I visited. I first learned of it from my road atlas heading southwest through Oregon not entirely sure of that day's destination. After driving through the Columbia River Gorge separating Washington from Oregon earlier in the day then past Mount Hood's snowy lonely peak I was hoping to make it a good portion of the way to Great Basin National Park in Nevada.

Steens Mountain turned out to be one of those miraculous road trip destinations that materializes along the way just where and when you need it. As beautiful as Olympic and Mount Rainier National Parks had been, they were both relatively busy. It was peak tourist season the week before the Fourth of July so I knew what I had been getting into, but still I preferred a little more solitude. Steens Mountain had not only splendid, airy, elevated isolation, but had this at the perfect point along the way between Washington and Great Basin.

I picked one of the many open campsites when I arrived far off the beaten path of the BLM-operated wilderness area in the late afternoon, then took the long, dirt backcountry byway to the top of the impressive fault block mountain out of which giant icy glaciers had scooped four great valleys. The views down the gorges testified to ice's chilly cutting strength. Unmarred by the slightest trace of humanity, the far off ridges presented the perfect backdrop to the delicate beauty of tiny wildflowers.

Once I'd explored a few of the lookouts, I broke out my folding easy chair and used my atlas to chart the next day's course. Overhead, the streaky gray of evening became electrified by the setting sun. It was a full spectrum sunset. First, smooth cotton ball blue clouds that brightened into gold-tipped swaths when the dull pink sphere sunk below the horizon, followed by a final display of red embers singeing the sky.