Back roads | Eastern Oregon

It's cold this morning. We're climbing out of LaGrande, heading for Baker City. We were at snow level in about 5 minutes! The highway climbs through the mountains to a flat plain of brilliant green grass, with dozens of Black Angus cattle and tiny little calves running about. Off to the right, the spectacular Anthony Lakes Wilderness area, bright in the early morning sun.

We stopped for gas in Baker City, and as soon as we got off the freeway, remembered this historic town from our last Moab trip. It has an 1880's courthouse, tree-lined streets full of old homes, manicured yards, wide streets. Great views of the mountains; wonder how cold it gets in the winter (and how much snow)? From here we head south on Hwy 7—the Elkhorn Scenic Highway. Gorgeous and remote, it's a great road for a sports car.

When we spotted this railroad museum, we had to stop even though they don't open until Memorial weekend. Spent an hour+ there, wandering through rolling stock and buildings, taking pictures, and doing some bird watching. It's still cold, though. All through this valley are the gravel piles of dredging; they've been here a long time judging by the size of the trees growing on them. Mining just tore up this gorgeous valley, leaving a wasteland of gravel pits and hills, with the river running through them.

Climbed over another mountain range to the town of John Day (we've been here before, but not by this route), then Canyon City. Amazing sports car road along the river, all the way to the town of Seneca.

There were endless photo opportunities, including a beaver dam, an oxbow lake wannabe, and the rusty-orange moose brush everywhere. Are there moose in NE Oregon? The road continued to climb and we started seeing Snow Zone signs; not comforting when driving in a Mazda MX-5, especially when we ran into snow yesterday when crossing into Oregon.

This will be the longest driving day of the trip, all the way to Winnamucca, Nevada. We passed long ranges of hills, endless cattle ranches, climbing up, then dropping down into long river valleys. Neither of us have ever driven through this part of Eastern Oregon. It's vast.

From 20 miles away we could see the huge thunderstorm hanging over town; kept expecting the skies to open and the rains to pour down. It was raining, but the rain never reached the ground. The huge sand dunes that stretched away on both sides of the highway were a magnet for ATVs of all sorts, even on this cold, windy day.

We spent the night in Winnamucca; after we chose a hotel, we found dinner at the Griddle, a diner on the main road with 1940s Nile Green booths and counter stools, lots of stained glass and Tiffany pendant fixtures, and amazingly good food. I had a turkey & roasted red pepper sandwich, with chipotle sauce. Yumm.

There's lots of Basque heritage here; unfortunately, we missed out on the traditional food because we didn't read about the town until breakfast time.