Up Black Butte and Back to Bend

After two days in Paradise, we were headed back to Bend.  But on the way we had a few stops to make.

The first was at the upper falls that we hadn't made it to the day before - by the time we got to the lower falls it was too late in the day to hike the extra mile round trip.  We've seen a lot of falls on this trip, and these ranked fairly high.  Especially since they could be accessed with a 60 yard walk from a parking lot!

Next up was a drive over the Santiam Pass, through a 90,000 acre forest fire-burned area, to Black Butte.  You may remember it from a couple posts ago as looking like this:

Or like this:

Black Butte, a very conical, isolated volcanic cone, rises about 6,400 feet above Bend and is quite hikeable.  A forest service road takes you to about 4,800 feet, leaving you with a fair climb to the top.  My legs were pretty knackered from the 18k the day before, but it was worth every step.

On the way up - that's the Sisters in the back left.

The second half of the trail edges around the side of the butte - it's sandy and you need to watch your footing if you don't fancy a tumble down the side!

A boarded up ranger station from the 1920s - if you look closely you can see there are numerous lightning rods sticking out from every corner.

If you look closely, you can see a bit of Mt. Hood in the back right among the clouds

The Sisters on the right, Broken Top on the left

On the way down with great views to the valley below.

Lots of smaller tree-covered volcanic cones dot the valley

I made it!

Back in Bend, we checked back into the Rainbow Motel and headed for Deschutes for a brewery tour.  We've been on many, but theirs was one of the best for sure - a really knowledgeable, friendly guide, free tasters, and a big, sparkling operation to show.  They are now the 5th largest craft brewer in the USA, and their surprisingly compact line bottles 1 million bottles of beer per week.  Not a typo: 1 million bottles per week of proper, tasty beer (at a rate of almost 7 bottles per second when operating). 

Employed people can buy the Collage collaboration between Deschutes and Hair of the Dog.  At $11 for a 330 ml bottle, we decided to wait.

Hanging out in the tasting room.

Deschutes' winter holiday seasonal is their Jubilale.  Each year they commission a local artist to design the label, and all the paintings hang in a mini-gallery in the building.  This is from 2010.

Outside the brewery.  These are their big new conditioning tanks.  There is space for 5 more of these tanks, which will take their capacity above 500,000 barrels per year

After dinner at 10 Barrel Brewing (which was packed and had live music early on a Sunday night), we finished off the evening by visiting Bend's newest brewery.  The Crux Fermentation Project opened only about 3 weeks ago.  They have a slick new brewpub in an old Aamco building with tasty beer on tap (but only one of their own so far, a "sweet IPA"), and tasty nut-free stout brownies.

Great view of the mountains out the roll-up door

A great way to spend our last night in Bend!