By the first weekend of September, Oregon had apparently decided summer was over. The forecast for Bald Knob Lookout was wet, cold, and foggy. I went anyway.
I wanted a couple of quiet days away from the usual hurry, and Bald Knob was another fire lookout I had been hoping to stay in. Murphy came with me, which meant I was not technically alone and none of my food would go unobserved.
Friday: Into the weather
The drive north was part of the reason for going. After Glendale, the route worked through the Cow Creek watershed, Eden Valley, and into the Coquille River country. Eventually, the pavement narrowed, then disappeared. Signs of society thinned out. The road kept climbing through country that felt farther away than it really was.
Rain followed us for most of the last stretch. By the time we reached Bald Knob, the fog had closed around the lookout so completely that there was no view to arrive to, other than the structure we'd come to stay in. The staircase rose into gray and the building appeared only when you were nearly underneath it.
I carried our gear up the wet stairs and opened the place for the weekend. I had to return to my truck to grab my glasses because I couldn't see the numbers on the lockpad, due to a combination of the darkened day and my advanced age. Murphy made his inspection, found the driest place to lie down, and appeared satisfied with the accommodations. I had booked two nights, which was the right decision. One night in a lookout can turn into a long unpacking job followed by an early-morning packing job. Two nights gave us time to actually be there and really settle in.
Once we were settled, Murphy and I took a walk down the road toward Panther Ridge. The fog stayed in the trees and erased anything beyond the next bend. There was no big overlook and no reason to pretend otherwise. It was just a wet forest, a quiet trail, and the two of us walking through it.
Back at the lookout, the cloud pressed against every window. Murphy and I spent the afternoon on the catwalk with the rest of the world missing beyond the railing. The weather made the place feel smaller, but also more like its own little world.
That first night was simple. I made dinner, watched the weather pass by the windows, played some guitar and harmonica, and watched a movie on the projector from my PrepperBox. A fire lookout is not a large room, so a projected movie does not have to work very hard to feel theatrical.
Saturday: Above the clouds
Saturday morning did not disappoint. Overnight, the gray sky had thinned out, then broke. Blue sky showed up overhead while the valleys below stayed covered. What had been fog around the lookout on Friday had settled into a broad, white layer beneath it.
From the catwalk, the ridgelines looked like islands. The road we had come in on was somewhere under all of it. Friday had felt closed in and almost eerie. Saturday opened the entire place up.
I made coffee and sat outside while the sun reached the lookout. Although that first weekend of September may still count as late summer on a calendar, it sure felt like the official beginning of fall in Oregon. The air was cool, the light had changed, and the clouds held below us for most of the morning.
Later, I put up the hammock and listened to the Oregon Ducks game on the radio. It was a pretty good arrangement: football in one ear, wind in the trees, and a view over the cloud layer whenever I looked up. There are worse places to spend a Saturday afternoon. Most of them have better reception.
The rest of the day did not need much of a schedule. we ate food when we were hungry, I consumed more coffee than necessary, strummed the guitar, and let Murphy move between patches of sun. That night I set up the projector again. The clouds were still below us, the lookout windows had gone dark, and the little room felt settled in a way it had not on Friday.
I put the weekend together in the video below. The title was obvious by Saturday morning.
Sunday: The road back
Sunday morning was quieter. I made coffee, packed the gear, swept the lookout, and carried everything back down the stairs. Murphy watched the loading process with the concern of a dog who suspected I might forget his bed, his food, or possibly him.
Then I locked the door and we headed back down the same road that had brought us in through the rain. We journeyed home a different route than we had taken to get there. This time we traveled North towards Powers, passing multiple campgrounds along the way. The weather was a bit schizophrenic, as sun and rain competed throughout the drive. Eventually, the rain relented and we arrived at home, refreshed from our peaceful weekend.
I did not go to Bald Knob expecting the weather to cooperate, and for the first day it did not. That ended up being part of the weekend. Friday gave us a lookout floating in fog. Saturday showed us what had been underneath it the whole time.
I went there because I needed a little distance from the usual noise and because I wanted another night in an old Oregon lookout. I came home with two very different days, a good football game heard from a hammock, and one more place I know I will remember.