Day Five: The Boise / Oregon Ghost Town Tour...

On Day Five we headed east from LaGrande, Oregon into the area some refer to as the "Alps of Oregon." If you take a look at this map you can actually see the very route we took, from LaGrande, through Wallowa, Enterprise, Joseph and finally Wallowa Lake.

It was a WONDERFUL, beautiful day of traveling and for this blog entry, I will let the pictures tell the story.

The first gorgeous site along the way (in Imbler, I believe) are the sunflower fields...

And then you get your first glimpse of the "Alps of Oregon" - The Wallowa Mountains in the distance...

In the city of Wallowa, there was this old church for sale....

The church had been converted to a residence. It was a mere $150,000 and a small part of my brain was thinking just how cool it might be to buy it. Not that I could actually *do* it, mind you, but still, it's fun to imagine.

Next, we stopped in Lostine, Oregon at this really cool coffee shack... The Blue Banana - and yes, that's an airplane going through the roof and a VW Bug through the wall. By the way, that VW bug is actually a "seat" inside the coffee shop.

and behind it is, well, "The Coffee Pot," where the family, um, took a little break. It's hard to tell in this shot, but that's a boat going through the roof.

Next, we drove through both Enterprise and Joseph, Oregon. Both were neat towns in their own right, but Joseph was really spectacular. Strangely, I didn't get any real great photos of the town, but you can go to the official Joseph, Oregon web site and get a good feel for it. You simply MUST check out the panoramas on the Joseph web site.

Finally, we arrived at the lovely Wallowa Lake... It is here that I got my favorite shot of the day of my son Nathan just chillin' out on the dock...

I just love the colors in that photo. And here's what he's looking at behind him...

Take a deep breath...

After some down time, we stopped and had some family fun!

That's a water pistol my little girl is holding and she took great joy in squirting mama and brother with her purple pistol! Nothing made me more happy this day than to see my entire family full of smiles and laughter.

It was a day of fun, relaxation, and simply enjoying life. After the above shot we took a two hour drive into the Willowa Mountains, and then headed back toward LaGrande. We ended the night (very late I might add) eating dinner at Shari's Restaurant and staying at the Best Western Inn in Hermiston, OR. That drive from LaGrande to Hermiston seemed very LONG after such a full day.

Well, Day Six brings more exploring as we hunt down some more old churches for a possible album cover photo shoot in Eastern Oregon!

Stay Tuned!

David