This is the first photo we took in Oregon. It's in the town of Glide, near where we spent the first night. I wasn't purposely closing my eyes; I was merely blinking. (Notice Eugene always looks good in his photos.)
But let's back up just a little. After leaving Utah, we spent Saturday night in Winnemucca, NV. Sunday morning we found a sacrament meeting to attend and one of the speakers was a young man who clearly had some disabilities. He told a story that impressed us both very much and we found it later on the internet:

Clay Balls (author unknown)

"A man was exploring caves by the seashore. In one of the caves he found a canvas bag with a bunch of hardened clay balls. It was like someone had rolled clay balls and left them out in the sun to bake. They didn't look like much, but they intrigued the man so he took the bag out of the cave with him. As he strolled along the beach, he would throw the clay balls one at a time out into the ocean as far as he could. He thought little about it until he dropped one of the balls and it cracked open on a rock. Inside was a beautiful, precious stone.

Excited the man started breaking open the remaining clay balls. Each contained a similar treasure.

He found thousands of dollars worth of jewels in the 20 or so clay balls he had left. Then it struck him. He had been on the beach a long time. He had thrown maybe 50 or 60 of the clay balls with their hidden treasure into the ocean waves. Instead of thousands of dollars in treasure, he could have taken home tens of thousands, but he just threw it away.

It's like that with people. We look at someone, maybe even ourselves, and we see the external clay vessel. It doesn't look like much from the outside. It isn't always beautiful or sparkling so we discount it. We see that person as less important than someone more beautiful or stylish or well known or wealthy. But we have not taken the time to find the treasure hidden inside that person by God.

There is a treasure in each and every one of us. If we take the time to get to know that person, and if we ask God to show us that person the way He sees them, then the clay begins to peel away and the brilliant gem begins to shine forth.

May we not come to the end of our lives and find out that we have thrown away a fortune in friendships because the gems were hidden in bits of clay.

May we see the people in our world as God sees them. "

I could just imagine that during this young man's life he had probably been regarded by many as not very valuable because of the clay vessel they saw. His father, who was the next speaker, said that when this young man was turning eight years old, there was some question about whether he needed to be baptized. He insisted on it, however, and so he was. When he was old enough he insisted on serving a mission, so they made special arrangements for him to live with a member in Salt Lake City, close enough for him to ride his bicycle every day to Welfare Square, where he served a full time mission washing dishes in the kitchen there. It was all quite inspiring to hear.

We like the story so much we have been using it as we visit with the members.

So, eventually we made it out of the wasteland that is Nevada and into Oregon, where the scenery changed immediately to lush green forests, mountains and rivers. Anyway, it seemed that way! After traveling many hours through endless forests and canyons, and one time going in the wrong direction 40 miles, we arrived at the home of President Smith and his lovely wife, Laura. President Smith is second counselor in the mission presidency and is assigned to work with the senior couples. They welcomed us warmly into their beautiful home, fed us a yummy dinner and gave us a comfy room for the night. This was way better than many bed and breakfast places we have stayed!

The next morning as we left Laura told us to be sure to stop and see the place where 3 rivers meet, so that is what the picture is of. Unfortunately, you cannot see that much detail from the picture. It was a pretty spot.