Following directions in Sullivan's hiking guide we parked at the base of Gray Butte and hiked south towards Smith Rock State Park. The trail starts off in the trees:
But then quickly pops out into the open. We could see Gray Butte itself towering above us. There are no trails that go up there, but there is a road:
You get a lot of bang for your buck on this hike. The views are stupendous almost right from the beginning.
And there are plenty of spring wildflowers too:
It was REALLY hot, so this area where a bunch of bitterroot were blooming was our turnaround point:
However, while Greg was taking hundreds of bitterroot photos I hiked a tiny bit further to a high point just ahead where I could see the tippy top of Mt. Hood:
As well as all the mountains spread out before me. Yowza!!
Looking back at Gray Butte. The trail we hiked in on can be seen on the slope on the right:
We would have gone further, but it was just too hot. We had also originally planned to do a short stretch of a different trail described in Sullivan's book, but we were sapped of energy from the heat, plus the clouds were gathering quickly, so we headed home. This is a cool area with a number of trails. We'd like to explore around here more, preferably when it's not so hot.