Leslie Gulch Day Trip

We had wanted to go camping this Summer. The weekends were disappearing quickly and I was running out of time being comfortable enough to go. We marked the calendar for June 21-23. Our friends, The Sorenson's were going to go with us. We had picked out a fun location and making plans for Gina and I to go up early and reserve the site, and the men would meet us after work. The weather was not showing signs of cooperating and it looked like the highs were going to be in the 60's. With little kids and being out in tents all night, this sounded somewhat miserable. With great sadness, we cancelled the trip and decided to do a little day hike instead.

Bryan suggested a place called Leslie Gulch in Oregon. I'd never heard of it, but decided it would be fun to get out since it would most likely be the only hiking trip I'd be able to go on. Construction slowed down our drive a little bit, but we were still able to get there in a little over an hour. The area was formed by volcanic rock. It was beautiful! The rock cliffs, colors, and shapes were amazing. We had a picnic lunch then started exploring.

The boys and Marc decided to play "king of the mountain" and climb to the top of a huge hill. Lexi and I decided not to let them have all the fun and soon joined them.

We drove down to the reservoir and were shocked at how low the lake was. It was weird to be driving on what is normally the bottom of the lake. We had a good rock skipping/throwing session:

By this time, the weather was heating up quite a bit. We drove back up to a trail head in one of the major gorges and started our hike. It was a little slow going with the kids stopping to climb on every other boulder or find hiding spots.

The shade provided by the rock cliffs was heavenly! We had a great time. It was fun to watch the kids explore and enjoy nature. We hiked just long enough to ware everyone out. It ended up being a great day and we were glad that we went! Thanks Sorenson's for the idea and going with us!