You know you’re in Oregon because the Tourist Information Kiosks are replicas of the venerated Conestoga Wagon.
Highway US26 out of Ontario runs flat and straight for many miles through farm and ranchland. The wait is worth it. First through hilly scrub brush and then through alpine forests, the road is a ribbon of twists and turns. Most of the curves are easy to track and suggested at 30-45 mph, so there’s no grabbing for handfuls of brake in an unexpectedly tight curve.
Once you pass through the town of John Day, you will begin to see that name a lot. Seems everything is named for this fellow, starting with the river that runs through this whole area of
eastern Oregon. There’s even a National Park named John Day that’s all about fossil beds andpaleontology. So who is this John Day guy?Idyllic campsite at the BMW rally site – first come first served must mean these folks arrived very early.
Well, it seems that John Day was an early settler who got robbed one day in 1810 at a well-known river crossing. From that day forward everyone called the river John Day, and the rest is history. Nice to be famous for something.
The curvy road is a delight, as is the BMWMOA rally site, the Dechutes Fairgrounds. Lots of grassy campsites, a very pretty central water feature that flows like a babbling brook, and plenty of air-conditioned display halls and event centers.
The Beer Ladies having more fun serving brewskies than drinking them!
Like any big motor bike rally, there’s food, a beer tent, music, every sort of motor bike gadget and farkle for sale, and plenty of seminars on everything from avoiding dehydration to picking the right kind of tires. And of course there are thousands and thousands of BMW and associated brand bikes to look at and their owners nearby ready and willing to gab at length about their bikes.
New roads, new bikes, new people to meet, there’s nothing like it.
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