Owyhee Canyonlands Road Trip 2016: Part 1

The Main Attraction Leslie and Juniper Gulch Scenic Areas

The Owyhee Canyonlands have been getting a lot of attention recently regarding the proposed national monument designation. Along with that, the Owyhee river, after years of low flows, finally reached levels suitable for rafting and kayaking causing river rats across the West to pack up and head to rural Eastern Oregon.

I've had my eye on the Owyhee area for the last couple of years so Kerrie and I decided to finally go check it out for our annual Memorial Day roadtrip. The Owyhee Canyonlands are located in one of the most remote areas of the American West so we definitely had to come prepared for this adventure. Since we were going to be out in that area of the state, we decided to forego visiting the Alvord and Steens area in favor of visiting a new area, the Elkhorn Mountains and eastern John Day River Territory.

Required stop at Barley Browns for hands down some of the best beer in Oregon

Ellie the Element would be able to handle the majority of the terrain, but we knew going into it that we wouldn't be able to reach all the location that we wanted without a car with high clearance.
Here we are at the end of Leslie Gulch. 

In total, we drove over 100 miles on dirt roads on this vacation. Gotta love that.

Heading bushwhacking into Timber Gulch

Patriotic Ducky always leading the way

William Sullivan's guide to Easter Oregon always giving us good advice.

Kerrie heading into Juniper Gulch

I call this one Falcon Rock. See it?

Anyone see Kerrie?

Canyoneering in Oregon or Oregon's Utah?

We camped two nights at Succor Creek Campground vs staying at the bottom of Leslie Gulch in Slocum Campground. While Slocum has more hiking nearby, Succor is a much more scenic and shaded campground.
Flying the Zag Flag for privacy.

Although the hiking right outside Succor Creek isn't actually all that bad. It's just not singletrack. 

There are 8 or so campsites for ppl with cars or RVs or you can cross this bridge and pick one of 12 or so tent sites.

We rolled the dice on the third day as Kerrie wanted to drive the gravel 37 mile Soldier Creek Watchable Wildlife loop and try to get into Three Forks Campground.
This is Kerrie at the Owyhee Canyons Viewpoint.

The only "wildlife" we saw on the drive in.

The drive down into Three Forks is recommended for high clearance vehicles so we were sure how it would go in our Honda Element so we walked a good portion of the road down and deemed that Ellie shouldnt have a problem. We have beefy tires on her so it was just a matter of clearance. Going in and out I only scratch the underbelly once, but that was mostly my fault for not paying attention. However, coming out, the last grunt is fairly steep and rocky. While in 2nd clearance, Ellie crawled up and over the last little bit while I was pushing the pedal to the floor. The engine started to over heat and I seriously thought we might have to reverse, but we had it in the end. Ultimately, I should have gotten a better running start, but have to remember that the car was pretty weighed down.

The reward for all our risk. General solitude in one of the most remote places in Western America. 

Catching some Zzzs while I went fly fishing.

I caught 5 what I believe to be lake trout so I was super stoked. I don't usually catch anything.

On the way out to the Elkhorns, we took a drive up the lower Owyhee to check out some legendary fly fishing waters. Unfortunately, it was the middle of the day and roasting hot, so I'll blame that on why I didn't catch anything, not my amateur fly fishing skills ;)

It was hot.