Camping at Pelton

Simtustus LakeThe Freed family tried to go camping back in May, but were stymied by cold, rainy weather. Tent camping in 40F with an infant and 3 year old are no fun, so we skipped it. But planned another trip in August to the desert where the weather would have to be good. This time we opted for Pelton Campground, which is a park run by PGE on the Simtustus lake, a reservoir on the Deschutes River. The campground is about 10 miles south of Warm Springs, and a lovely piece of eastern Oregon. The whole family was along, so we had my parents in their popup, us in our gigantent, and Hilly & Hassy in another 2 person tent. It was quite the site as well, directly above the swim area and dog swim area.

Over the course of the long weekend, we did some fishing, canoeing, mallow roasting, cooking and eating, reading, and playing on the playground. The desert did disappoint a bit – it was never more than 75F, and most of the time it was also rather breezy, so swimming was a little challenging. The girls didn’t seem to mind much though, but still preferred the playground to the swimming. Ella even tried her hand at fishing, but didn’t have much success. She didn’t mind though because Grandma taught her about licorice, the bait that serious fishermen use for themselves. She really got in to that. We did find a slightly better place to fish later, but only caught pike minnows, which there’s a bounty on.

The good news is that the girls are really digging camping. Maddie woke up multiple times during the night, screaming on a few occasions, but Ella was upset when it was time to go home, expressing interest in staying longer. Here are a few pics.