Grande Ronde Trip Report

Submitted by Natalie Bennon

We had a group of 17 people -- 7 adults and 10 teenagers (!). We put in on June 15 at Minam Store, mile 8.5 of the Wallowa River, a little after noon. We floated not too many miles and camped on the Wallowa, but I can't remember where and did not note it.

On June 16, we floated on and entered the Grande Ronde River. We camped on the left around mile 74.5.

One June 17, we floated to mile 66 and we had a great site on the right, just across from Bear Creek. At this site, we saw a juvenile moose cross the river from river left to river right, our side just a little downstream. We had a few moments where we thought, that must be an elk, but it was definitely a moose. Had a hump. Someone took photos with a film camera, and we don't have them developed yet; we got no digital photos. The camp upstream from us, next day, also confirmed they thought it was a moose. Turns out there are about 50 moose in Oregon, and ODFW wants to know if we see one, so we will report it to ODFW shortly. This camp also had goats on the edge of camp, munching on plants and mostly ignoring us. They definitely were not at all scared of us. If anything, they were annoyed we were there. We had a rousing game of Frisbee Cup at this camp, with teens against grownups most of the time, and mostly the grownups winning but not always.

Frisbee Cup is a made up game with two goals -- one on each side of a relatively flat area, around 20-30 feet apart. The goals are made of two very thin PVC pipes, each goal about 4 feet tall, stabbed into ground with plastic cups on top of each pipe. The goals are the width of a frisbee. Each team stands at their goal. They throw the frisbee to the opposite goal. If they get one cup off, it's 1 point; 2 cups, two points; frisbee goes through the goal, 2 points (regardless of whether it knocks cups off). Defending team can try to catch a cup that gets knocked off, in which case that cup, if it doesn't touch the ground, does not score the Offensive team any points. Clear as mud? We also played later on a different river with a sand beach using kayak paddles (broken down into their two pieces) stabbed into sand, and plastic camp mugs on top; that worked fine too if you have sand or soft ground to put the paddle blades into.

Anyway, we wanted to do a layover day, but since we had stopped so soon on June 17, we needed to make up ground. So we packed up camp and floated again. We went past Powwatka Bridge. Stopped in Troy to drop off trash, buy some more beer and ice, and use a real toilet. Then we kept going to mile 58.5, right before Skyfoot Creek, river right. Not very far! We only went like 8 miles. And the river was moving fast. So our days on the river were short.

Next day, 6/19, we floated much farther, to mile 33, McNeill Island. We camped on the island. It took forever to find a suitable campsite, and when we did, it was late. The site was serviceable, but not good. Tents were on top of a lot of plants. Past Powwatka Bridge or Troy, the camping is hard to find. 

We took out at Boggans Oasis on June 20 and had a burger before the long drive home. One group had car trouble on the way home, in Pendleton, but it turned out okay and they made it home same day. And I learned that some teenagers (not all) like rafting more when we're with a big group and other teens. Good note to self.