More Summer Trips

Ok, so its been a while since I have been able to sit down finish posting about our trips last summer. After our trip to Sumpter/John Day, we spent a week at the coast. Most of our time at the coast was spent playing in tide pools and seeing non-geology things, but I did take one picture of some barchan dunes on the beach below the Yaquina Bay Lighthouse.

On the trip back to the east side of the state, we took the scenic detour through the desert high plains. This allowed us a stop at Crater Lake, which Sam had been wanting to go see ever since we moved to Oregon.

Stanton at the Rim near the North Entrance

We got to the park about 1 hour to late to take the boat ride (next time Sam) so we did the obligatory drive around the lake. Sam's favorite stops was at Pinnacles, where the steam from fumaroles welded together the overlying pumice and ash into an erosion resistant hoodoo.

On the way back from Pinnacles, we stopped at the new trail in the park, a 2.5 mile out and back to Plaikni Falls. It was a nice little trail through the woods, and the falls at the end were a nice surprise (ok I knew there was a waterfall, but it was more impressive that I had anticipated). Sam, however was tired, so by the time we got to the falls she had transformed into a bit of a sullen teenager.

Plaikni Falls

I think overall, Sam was a little disappointed in the lake. (I found out later that, being who she is, what she really had wanted to do was go swimming in the Lake. She didn't expect only one access to the lake that was 2-3 miles down a steep trail to a non-existent beach that would have been hypothermia inducing cold at that rate!)

Sawtooth Crater

So Sam has been travelling over in Europe, and Stanton and I have been in the midwest. Hopefully we will put some posts up from that later. But yesterday, Sam was in La Grande for an orthodontist appointment (braces are in her near future), so I thought we'd take advantage of being in the Grande Ronde valley and try a hike, one I thought might be interetsing for a future field trip.

In the end, I probably would not take a class because it was a long drive (about 30 miles SE of Union or 20 miles NE of Baker) , a short hike, and limited geology, but it was neat.  Sawtooth Crater is the remnant of a Miocene aged shield volcano. The main feature is a central spire that raises about 420feet above the crater floor and two prominant radial dikes that extend to the NE and SW.

My picture of the central cone is not very good, I took it from where the trail comes up to the NE radial dike

From that point, instead of going up to the central cone, we went NE towards the rim. From there we had some good views of the steeply dipping platy andesite that makes up the dikes. Here is a 1.45m Stanton in front of the ridge.

And here is a view of the same section of the dike from the crater rim, about 500m away.

Along the top of the dike, the andesite formed thin, steeply dipping layers that are very angular (sharp) along the ridgeline

Although I did not see any evidence of tuff, in a couple of places along the rim, I found pycroclastice bombs

In all a neat little hike, but the long drive for a short hike. We had hoped to do another hike in the area, but it was getting late so we headed home