Days 144 to 146 (5 - 7 June)

3 Zero Days in Sisters

We sleep in and wake up well rested. This campground is really lovely: lots of room, a creek flowing right next to our site, clean showers and restrooms and a five minute walk away from the town centre.

First thing we do is prepare the boxes we plan to ship to Etna because we had shipped way too much stuff to the Timberline Lodge and are still carrying that huge box with us. While Dario drops the boxes off at the Post Office to have them sent to Etna I go to the grocery store to get some cherry tomatoes, cheese and a fuel canister. Now we're all set, ready to head out. Except for breakfast! We've been looking forward to a real American breakfast burrito and look up online where we should go. The "Hop and Brew" it is, right around the corner from the campground. And it's delicious. We are sitting outside, downloading some maps and checking the weather forecast. To be honest, it really doesn't look good. Bad weather is one thing, snow covered mountains another thing. Those two combined - probably not so much fun and possibly a bit dangerous. Are we up for this? Not really. Are we in a hurry? Not at all. Then it's decided, we will stay in Sisters and let the bad weather roll through the mountains while staying dry down here. We now have three full days in this cute little town where a big event is coming up - the Sisters Rodeo, one of the biggest, if not the biggest in the US!

The next couple days are filled with an unusual amount of reading, relaxing, eating good food, talking to interesting people and blogging in the library. One night we go to the Sisters Saloon for some burgers and a Caesar salad, everything is being prepared for the rodeo and the atmosphere is great! This is America like in the movies. It's kinda cool and we are definitely enjoying ourselves. In a month from now we will almost be back home after almost 15 months and we appreciate still being out and about, feeling free and flexible.

After three days of rest, many delicious breakfast burritos, a lot of hours spent in the library and restaurants we pack our stuff on Friday night, ready to head out the next day. The weather will be perfect again - warm and sunny! Tomorrow morning a trail angel called Fred will pick us up at 6.30am and take us to the trail head up at McKenzie Pass, or at least as close as possible since the pass is still closed for traffic. We missed the trail and can't wait to head back out there tomorrow!