More river-life, 100 piles of poo, and Big Blue whines
Following the success of our last river-boondocking spot, we wanted more water in our view. We knew the chances of matching our swimming hole was nonexistent, but a creek/stream/river always adds something special to a spot in the woods. So with that ammunition, Kerri scoured the satellite maps and pinpointed a few locations for us to scout on the final day of our weekend. We needed something secluded to avoid the Fourth of July camping crowds.
It didn’t take long for us to find a spot (not from Kerri’s scouring) and another. In fact, I don’t think we even made it to one of Kerri’s spots before we called it at the second place we found. Down a short dirt road, after a long gravel one, through a few yards of tightly packed trees, and snuggled right up beside yet another Oregon creek was our home for the week.
We had found our home so early in the day that we decided to get a few chores accomplished while we had the time. With the mosquitoes starting to come out in force in recent weeks, we had picked up all the supplies to re-screen Big Blue’s side windows for a bit more security from the bastards. Now I don’t know where or when I have done this task before in my life, but I know I hated it – re-screening, that is. I wasn’t all that fond of it this time either, but with Kerri’s help the job was accomplished and we had some seriously mosquito proof windows on each side of the van. We then made up a few more screens for the driver and passenger windows that simply magnet into place. Combined, we would now have four windows we could leave open to alleviate the heat while staying bug-free inside.
The week passed. Work was accomplished. We even got to spend a few hours outside enjoying a cocktail creek-side before the mosquitoes’ attack proved too strong for us to stay out. Originally, we thought we would stay the following Saturday to just take a day off – no driving, no scouting, etc – for a change, but by the end of our work week we felt the need to get back on the move more than anything. So, on Saturday morning we packed up and headed out for new adventures.
We had a few things nor far down the road that we thought we would go see. One in particular is the Umpqua Hot Springs. They looked beautiful in the images we were seeing, and we felt we could get there early enough on Saturday morning to beat any crowds. However, after Kerri looked into the public hot springs a bit further she found good reason never to go there; poop. Human poop to be exact. So much of it that it caused an E coli outbreak in the hot springs. Then some ass-hat poured bleach in the springs to remedy that. Of course, the 100+ piles of human feces recently found immediately surrounding the hot springs (even though there are vault toilets!!!) proved that it was not a place we wanted to visit. The last thing we needed was to bathe in people’s poo and E coli or bleach, no matter how pretty it might seem. So, instead we dropped in for a visit to Toketee Falls which proved to have a lot less poo. 
The adventuring ended quickly though as Big Blue began complaining about some injury. A quick inspection and it was clear that all our recent off-asphalt exploring is taking a toll on the old van. Yet another ball joint (the same one as our Baja breakdown) has been been blown out of it’s perch, again. A replacement was going to be needed… soon. We ended our week by turning towards and limping into the nearest city – 80 miles away – for a parts store.
