A Great Place For A Birthday!

We are on the Oregon Coast enjoying my birthday. This is one of my favorite places to be, but I digress as there are many more items to catch up on before we show you the beach.

After leaving Utah we stopped in Boise Idaho to drop off items for Amanda.  We loaded up every available inch of our trunk for her to help get her things there. Our things went in the backseat with Cenny.  Next stop was Baker Oregon where we went to the Oregon Trail Interpretative Center.  Amanda recommended it from a previous trip.  It was extremely well done and worth the two hours we had before closing.

We then left Baker and headed into the Wallowa Mountains and East Eagle Creek where for my first 18 years we spent 2 weeks every summer.  The cabin we used was built by my grandfather back in the late 1800's for operating his gold mine.  When my mother was a young girl their family would spend the entire summer at the cabin.  She learned to hunt, fish and live a primitive life.  They diverted water from the creek to run through the meadow in front of the cabin for water and to run a water wheel which generated enough electricity for 1 light bulb.  Each room in the cabin had a light bulb hanging from the ceiling but there was only enough electricity to turn one on at a time.  Mom learned to sew on a treadle sewing machine and became an excellent seamstress.


When we moved to California in 1964, we quit going to the cabin and the last time I saw it standing was when I took Eileen, Lisa, Kristi and Steven in 1973.  After years of non-use and no maintenance it eventually collapsed.

This is the road into the meadow where grandfather had three cabins and other buildings for his mine operations.  Two cabins and a garage are still standing.  Grandmother gave both cabins to families in Baker.   Our cabin was around the corner from the garage on the right at the other end of the meadow.

We built a great two seater outhouse out of an old 6 ft x 6 ft meat house.  It had screen on all four sides from the knees down and the chest up.  There was a flag to raise when occupied.  One seat was adult size and one child size.  Sadly this is all that is left of it.