Trip to Northern Oregon

[Truvelo]

I've just returned from a visit to Northern Oregon starting from PDX and going to Enterprise. Here's some of the pictures I took.

I-84 exit 238


Route 82 between Elgin and Wallowa where there seems to be endless construction to stabilize the embankment.


Route 351 near Wallowa Lake with snow on the mountains in summer.


Route 82 through Enterprise with more snow in the distance.


Joseph, OR. A charming little place which is obviously a tourist trap with many pubs and restaurants built in a traditional style which reminds me of old cowboy towns.


I-84 near Pendleton. Here the scenery is more like high desert rather than Pacific Northwest.


I-84 with Mt Hood in the distance.

[agentsteel53]

very nice!  I remember at one point attempting to drive from Joseph to OR-86 via OR-350 and getting badly lost and not being able to find OR-350 out of town.

[xonhulu]

Great photos!  The Joseph area is one of my favorite destinations in Oregon; I try to get up there every summer.

Question: were OR 350 and OR 351 shields actually posted on those routes?  They were still unsigned last August, but since OR 350 is shown on the last year's State Highway map, I've been wondering if its signing is imminent.

Jake: the route you mention wouldn't have been passable last year anyway, as the Forest Road connecting 350 to 86 was closed by slides last August when I was last there.  I don't know if it's been re-opened since.  Anyway, it's a fairly cool drive, but a better one is to take 350 all the way to Imnaha, then continue on the gravel Grizzly Ridge Rd 24 miles out to the Hat Point lookout tower, which offers a much better view into Hells Canyon than the Hells Canyon Overlook further south.

[agentsteel53]

Great photos!  The Joseph area is one of my favorite destinations in Oregon; I try to get up there every summer.

Question: were OR 350 and OR 351 shields actually posted on those routes?  They were still unsigned last August, but since OR 350 is shown on the last year's State Highway map, I've been wondering if its signing is imminent.

Jake: the route you mention wouldn't have been passable last year anyway, as the Forest Road connecting 350 to 86 was closed by slides last August when I was last there.  I don't know if it's been re-opened since.  Anyway, it's a fairly cool drive, but a better one is to take 350 all the way to Imnaha, then continue on the gravel Grizzly Ridge Rd 24 miles out to the Hat Point lookout tower, which offers a much better view into Hells Canyon than the Hells Canyon Overlook further south.

I attempted the run in April 2007.  Did not see a single OR-350 shield.  It wasn't labeled on my 2007 RMN either; but that map showed a solid gray line, implying a decent quality road.

how good or bad is the Grizzly Ridge Road?  Traversable by ordinary two-wheel-drive low-clearance car?

[corco]

I've done both- both are passable by 2WD car with no problems. I did the one via Imnaha in a friend's 1989 Camry back in high school, and the other way I've taken several times in a bunch of different cars as it's a lot faster to get from Cambridge ID to Joseph than going via Imnaha.  

In case of extreme craziness, keep going to the bridge from Oxbow into Idaho and then take those roads all the way to the Tamarack factory- I had a friend in high school who swore by going that way*. We tried it once and decided he was an idiot.

*(this friend may or may not have been me wanting to take a cool new route)

[nexus73]

As an Oregon native, I thank you for posting up the pix of what can be seen in northeastern Oregon.  Since I live on the south coast, it's rare for me to get to the opposite corner of the state.  Oregon is the 10th largest state in the nation and there is a wide variety of countryside and city to see.  Your photos captured this variety quite well!

Rick

[Truvelo]

Regarding routes 350 and 351 - I wasn't really paying any attention to signs as the scenery was overwhelming me. However, I've just looked at the pictures I took around Joseph and Wallowa Lake and I can't see any shields other than 82 heading towards Enterprise. Is there any need for 351 to exist as extending 82 down to the southern end of the lake would work better.

Here's some more pictures:

Route 82 somewhere between Elgin and Wallowa


The Blue Banana in Lostine with a VW Beetle and airplane crashed into it.


A short 4-lane section of route 11 near Weston with hardly any traffic.


The last photo from my trip returning to PDX.

[xonhulu]

Is there any need for 351 to exist as extending 82 down to the southern end of the lake would work better.

Agreed, in fact until a few years ago I thought OR 82 did extend to the state park.

[xonhulu]

how good or bad is the Grizzly Ridge Road?  Traversable by ordinary two-wheel-drive low-clearance car?

When I was a kid, my dad drove us out there, and that road was awful -- we were straddling gullies and rattled to the bone by almost constant washboard stretches.  But the Forest Service rebuilt the road in 1990, so it's now in pretty good shape, and like corco said any passenger car should be o.k. on it.  It's steep and narrow coming out of Imnaha, hugging the hillside above a pretty substantial drop: not a drive for the acrophobic:





Unfortunately, a recent fire burned the forest around the tower, so it's not quite as nice as it was before, but still worth the trip:

[agentsteel53]

one lane or two lane road?

in any case, it looks better than CA-173, which I once drove in some small compact car despite it being not much more than a parallel pair of ruts.

[xonhulu]

One lane.  And it's nowhere near the worst road I've driven on, either.

[Truvelo]

Unfortunately, a recent fire burned the forest around the tower, so it's not quite as nice as it was before, but still worth the trip

Looking at the pictures it seems the forest has already started to regenerate. In a few years the trees will be tall enough to make the area resemble a forest again.