Traveling Maniacs- Hwy 22, and Detroit Dam, OR

Leaving Bend, OR, we took Hwy 20 (or 22, can’t recall) through Sisters, OR.

Anyway, we got stuck behind a truck of HAY.  And we don’t recommend that… a couple of years back we were traveling in central, CA and a bale of hay fell off a truck and I hit it POOF hay exploded around us.  It seemed harmless enough, except they don’t make cars like they used to…and basically our Odyssey bumper is held on by PLASTIC clamps.  Part of the bumper (on the left popped out exposing the plastic clamp that detached and Bill had to pop it back on) – so basically, a bale of hay almost broke off our bumper…

… so we were behind this truck…and hay kept flying at us and all I could think of was hitting a bale of hay…if our bumper could sustain another hit by said bale of hay…AND David Bowie providing soundtrack music in my head that begins with “HEY, MAN…” (leave it alone and) “HEY, MAN”  Yes, I play movies in my head that star US with soundtrack and everything.  So,

Suffragette City was playing

Love me some David Bowie, loved his hair style and look in this video. 🙂

So, at some point, we see a road sign that we don’t know what it means.  Don’t you hate that, and you can always GOOGLE, but sometimes you don’t have good connection.  So, sitting in the passenger seat, I was able to quickly shoot off a facebook post inquiring of my smart friends what the yellow sign “Sunken Grade” meant.  Someone responded and of course, they pulled it from Wikipedia! 🙂 We don’t see signs like this in Southern, CA.  However, OR is very fond of having no side shoulder to pull off on- they go into mini ditches.

To make matters worse, when there was an area for slow cars to pull off, they WOULDN’T!  No slow cars will pull off to the right to allow passing. We got stuck behind this SLOW motor home for miles and miles.  There was a long line of cars behind him.  Three opportunities presented itself with a big side area created for this very purpose of allowing faster cars to pass.  We kept trying to pass when road allowed, but there was always a vehicle coming on the other side.   I feared some frustrated driver would get all crazy and attempt to pass several cars at once and creating a pile up… (seriously)  and what is UP with “no center line.”  on a 2 lane hwy.  scary.

In the middle of this driving trip, we pulled over to check out Detroit Dam.  The Dam itself only had a couple of dudes fishin’.  The water looked beautiful and I would have liked more time to explore this lake as there is  camping, swimming, boating etc.  Detroit Lake   Oddly, we didn’t see any boats or people in the water.  Of course, this lake is huge and we couldn’t see through all the trees.  It would have been nice to camp. We passed the camp grounds on the highway.  another time.  thank goodness, they just had a fire this week and we were already through there!  Whew!

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