big rock cotton mountain

Everyone needs a break from virus isolation now and then.

In Mexico, there are plenty of options. I can isolate myself in my Ford Escape bubble and drive the coast highway -- or I can head north inland to tackle the mountains and its villages. The only problem is that I am in Oregon, not in Barra de Navidad.

I guess "problem" is the wrong word because Oregon offers a wide variety of road trips for the virus-weary. Darrel, Christy, and I took one yesterday.

When I fly into the Redmond airport, Darrel picks me up for the drive to Prineville. On each trip, I have noticed a pyramidal mountain poking up on the horizon between a series of rounded buttes. Its shape is what originally caught my attention. Just like Brigadoon, though, it mystically disappears the closer we get to it.

The Cotton Boys are not so easily defeated when adventure is on tap. So, yesterday around noon, all three of us transferred our jargonish "bubble" to the Toyota 4Runner and headed off to conquer our mysterious mountain.

Darrel had spent the night before researching on Google maps and had a good idea where we could corner our prey. Instead of turning left to drive into Prineville when we came to the Oregon 380 junction, we turned right onto the Paulina highway -- so called because the highway ends at Paulina.

It turned out to be one of those great winter days in central Oregon. Clear skies. Shirt-sleeve weather in the 40s. A dusting of snow on the ground. And enough scenery to ooh and aah the most curmudgeonly amongst us.

I am not a central Oregon travel virgin, but I always run into one tempting shot after the other when I drive through the countryside. The photograph at the top of this essay is a good example. A ranch now on the market that set Christie's homesteading juices flowing.

Even though it is easy to imagine oneself as an early pioneer in the 1800s, you need to keep your view on the ground because Oregon skies are streaked with the contrails of jet planes -- filled with people humming "don't know when I'll be back again." But these contrails are a gift to my British fellow blogger Gary Denness. Maybe this is what the union jack would look like if the other nations kicked out the English.

We were all surprised to run across a herd of buffalo. Not the thundering herds of the American plains. The American buffalo (or, more appropriately, Bison) no longer freely roams the continent. Most of them, like this small congregation, have been reduced to the status of domestic livestock. But their distant ancestors did roam portions of Oregon when the settlers moved into these hills.

One thing central Oregon has in abundance is rock. This portion of the state is filled with extinct cinder cones and collapsed caldera. As a result, a good portion of the rock here is tuff -- solidified ash. It is everywhere. Rim rock. Buttes. And some rather spectacular clumps exposed by erosion. Most likely, an ex-butte.

When we finally found our mountain, it was a bit of a disappointment. Just like Tom Cruise, it is far shorter in person. The antenna on its summit gives it a utilitarian purpose that somewhat takes away from the magical aura we had vested on it.

But, like all road trips, the destination was not the real reason for venturing forth. We were surprised by new sights and awed (or aahed) by others. Best of all, we shared the experience, related old stories, and lied about ourselves a little.

And next week, I will be able to do the same thing in Mexico. Unfortunately, without the company of Darrel and Christy.