Fields, OR and Denio, NV

When the North Loop met back up with OR-205, we had two choices: Drive 45 miles south to Fields, or drive 10 miles north to Frenchglen. Problem: after guzzling the gas on the mountain, we had about 50 miles of gas left. We'd heard a rumor that gas was available in Fields, and knew that Frenchglen had gas pumps (which appeared to not have been used in a long time.) Do we drive to Frenchglen and hope the pumps work? Or, do we drive to Fields hoping the "miles to empty" gauge is not overestimating? We went to Fields.

Fields Gas Station

The road to Fields was long and flat, and the trip there saw us flatten our first non-bug form of wildlife. There were a bunch of birds sitting on the road, and all of them but one scattered when we came through. The one that didn't... became a puff of feathers in the rearview mirror. The first sign of human life we saw along the way was Fields, which consisted of the Fields Station and not much else. We were in luck: the gas station was open. Eighteen gallons and $63 later, we had a full tank of $3.49/gal gasoline. Along with the rumor of good gas, we'd heard about the awesome milkshakes. We couldn't pass them up.

At this point, we were only 20 miles from being in Nevada instead of Oregon. Once we had the tank full of gas, there was no discussion -- we went to Nevada!

Nevada-Oregon State Line

The town of Denio, NV is right on the state line. We drove through town in about 20 seconds, continued for a coupe more miles, and then turned around and headed back toward Burns. There was exactly one hotel room left in town at the Comfort Inn in Hines (the Harney County Fair was in town, so all the rooms were full.) Once we got settled into our room, I turned on my cell phones and laptop and checked my messages for the first time since Bend. All of a sudden, bells, whistles, and alarms started going off -- Apple had released new iPods between Bend and Burns. Apparently, this was big news.

Dinner was at a crappy Denny's wannabe called "The Apple Peddler."