Field Trip to Baker City

Saturday morning luxury: sleeping in a little bit.  Unfortunately, I don’t sleep in, but it’s a nice thought.

We went out for coffee to OC Coffee (Owayhee County Coffee) with Steve and Sharon and a few retired SOWERs who live on the Hope House campus.  Great conversations, it’s fun to hear the stories the retired SOWERs have to tell about projects they have been on and work they have done.

I realized I neglected to take any pictures today, so you’ll have to imagine us and several other people sitting around this table, quaffing our favorite hot beverage and eating a gigantic cinnamon roll.

Our coffee conversations lasted until nearly noon, then we loaded up on fresh water, emptied the waste tanks, and prepared to take off to Baker City, Oregon, just over two hours away.  Interstate driving most of the way and the landscape gets desolate and barren as soon as the highway leaves the Snake River.

We stopped briefly at Farewell Bend State Park but there really wasn’t much to do there except look at the Snake River so we moved on.

In Baker City we stopped at a site that had a rather overgrown Chinese cemetery.  There was a Chinatown here and many Chinese helped the burgeoning railroad and in the gold mines, unfortunately, they were often taken advantage of and forced to work as cooks, shepherds and gardeners and were buried here.  Many names were not known, and some were exhumed and returned to families in China.

Right across the street was a rather weathered replica of a Dutch windmill.  One of the blades of the fan was missing and the place was locked up with no trespassing signs all over it.  De Zwaan it was not, but it was an interesting juxtaposition, being right across the road from the Chinese cemetery.

We parked downtown and walked the historic downtown area for a while.  Their chocolate store was more of an art gallery with a small chocolate counter in the back.  Two truffles set us back six bucks

On the way through town we happened across another ​World’s Largest​, so we had to stop and take a picture, adding it to our collection.  World’s Largest Map of the Oregon Trail.  Painted on the side of a building.

Just around the block from here is an AirBnB where we met brother Duane and Cheryl, who drove down from Washington with Elizabeth to see us.  Baker City is about midway between where we are serving in Marsing and where they live. Always good to see family, especially far away family.