Well I finally found my old picture album of the John Day River Bass fishing trips. I hadn't seen the album for several years and actually forgot how few pictures there are in it of fish. Those fish pictures are stored away somewhere else and right now I don't have a clue as to where. So here are some, mostly scenic pictures of a couple of our trips down the river.
This is a picture of "Basalt Rapids."
This is a picture of a basalt wall, which is pretty common along the edges of the river in many places.
This is a picture of one of our campsites along the river. You can see a couple of our drift boats in the background. We all had fibreglass boats. I would have never attempted to drift this river at the levels that we did it with a wooden or aluminum boat. The dark green boat was mine and the white one was my friend Tab's boat. Russ's boat is not in the picture.
This is a picture of "Cathedral Rock."
This is a picture of a cave way up on the hillside above the river. It doesn't look very big from down on the river.
Here is a picture of me standing in the mouth of the same cave. It's a lot bigger than it looks from down below.
Here I was inside the cave and looking back down at the river. If you look real close you can see the boats pulled up on the river bank.
Here is another one of our campsites.
This is a place called "Cave Bluff." It is a shallow cave right on the water line, and when the river is up a little more than it was here, you can row your boat back into it a little way. When it's 110 degrees out and you've been sitting in the sun all day it sure is nice to go into there and cool off. It's like rowing the boat into an air conditioned room it is so cool in there.
This is an old homestead that was built about 1894 by an immigrant from Scotland by the name of Farquer McRae. There is still a guy living in it. He runs the lower ranch for an elderly lady named Mrs. Mary Mauer who now owns this land. The fella's name is Dennis Ball, and over the years he and I have become pretty good friends. We would always pull in and visit with Dennis every year, and most times take him a case of beer. He wasn't home the day I took this picture, so we put the beer in the refrigerator and went on our way. And let me tell you, rustic is not the word for the inside of this place. The first time I ever went into the house I could see why Dennis drinks so much.
This is a little gravesite that belongs to a little girl by the name of Chrissy Scott. I took the following story from a book that I bought many years ago titled "The John Day River Drift and Historical Guide" by Arthur Campbell:
James Scott and his wife worked for Farquer as foreman and housekeeper/cook. The Scotts had a daughter named Chrissy, who was about 5 years old. Farquer was devoted to her; he used to carry her around on his shoulders. Chrissy had golden hair and big blue eyes. In about 1930, Farquer came down with diphtheria and nerly died. One day shortly after he recovered he and Chrissy were playing in the John Day river near Farquer's cabin. Chrissy was in an old washtub and Farquer had tied a rope to one of the handles. He would push her out a ways and pull her back in. Chrissy managed to overturn the tub and fell into the cold water. Farquer got her to the bank, but as a result of the spill, Chrissy got very ill with a high fever, came down with diphtheria and died.
Farquer never forgave himself; he insisted that she be buried on his ranch above the John Day River. He tenderly constructed a special concrete wall 4 feet above the ground and placed a wrought iron gate at one end. Chrissy rests there to this day, protected in death by an enclosure which seems to symbolize Farquer's remorse. The gate is rusted shut and giant wild rye grass encloses the plot. After her death, Farquer moved to an upper ranch and never lived at the river ranch again.
This and the next few are pictures of what is known as "Clarno Rapids."
Clarno Rapids
Clarno Rapids. In this picture my friend Tab got hung up on the rocks and couldn't get lose. We eventually waded out and threw him a rope and got his boat to slide over the big rock and he made it on out of there.
Clarno Rapids
Clarno Rapids
This is a picture of me with two bass I caught on the same plug. That happened quite a bit.
This is my fireman buddy Russ and his wife Pat with a few fish that we caught. We had them for breakfast that morning.
This spot is called "Hoot Owl Rock." That little rock standing on the ledge in the left side of the picture looks just like a giant owl when you are just the right distance from it. We would camp here many times and would usually see a herd of California Desert Bighorn Sheep in this area.
Hoot Owl Rock
This is my friend Tab's wife June with an almost 5 lb. Smallmouth Bass.
This is another one of our campsites. We called this one the Mulberry camp as those are Mulberry trees we camped under. We stayed at this place every year.
Mulberry Camp
This is on the old George Owens Ranch. At the turn of the century the town of Condon, Oregon (which is about 75 miles from here) tore out their old water supply pipes and replaced them with steel pipes. The Owens brothers gathered up the old Wooden Water Mains and took them to their ranch and intended to use them for irrigation, but it never worked out and the pipes are still laying all over the place at the old ranch.
These pictures were taken at a place called "Potlatch Canyon." Potlatch in Indian language means "Big Feast." These are what are known as Petroglyphs, or indian carvings in the rock walls. We never did learn what the different symbold meant.
Petroglyph
This is Tab's brother-in-law Phil. Phil found out the hard way that when fishing in a small boat like these, it is very important to look behind you before you cast. Tab went to make a cast and stuck two of the three treble hooks in this Rapala plug into the side of Phil's face. Phil fortunately had the presence of mind to grab the line before Tab made the cast.
Every year we would run into at least one of these guy's. I'm John would have liked to have been on this trip.
I named this place "Rhino Rock" years ago, for obvious reasons.
This and the next 8 pictures are just pictures of some of the scenery on the river.
Subject: John Day River Oregon 
Sat Dec 29, 2007 7:22 pm
