SUNSET CRATER VOLCANO IS A VOLCANO?

 There is no doubt the Sunset Crater Volcano is a volcano, but . . . ? ? ?

Some Eastie will drive up the Sunset Crater National Monument, see it and log it in as a volcano for the rest of their lives.

They’ll tell all of their pals they’ve seen a real volcano, adding it to the time they drove through the Great Smokey Mountains.

After that they’re the go-to outdoorsman on the block, a modern day Lewis Clark.

This is it?

Any self respecting Oregonian knows this is a volcano, but different than ours.

Ours have snow to ski on, permanent glaciers so far, and crevasses to not fall into.

What we don’t have, which was a big surprise after the ‘volcano,’ is this:

And this:

Which leads to this:

And this:

We were the only people out on a long off-highway road dead ending in a turn-around with a restroom.

Federal land with a path to the pueblo.

It felt like finding a hidden castle in the forest, except for castle and forest part, but you know what I mean.

We had it all to ourselves for about twenty minutes.

For twenty minutes I tried to figure out how anyone could build and live there. And why?

I’m looking at the landscape and feeling good about Oregon and about anyone who goes off-road enough for those twenty minutes of, ‘What the hell were they thinking in 1040?’

Take the loop road through the federal parks when there’s a loop to take.

Find those twenty minutes and stretch them out.

If your wife asks why?

Show them a picture of this guy and keep going.

That should do it.