Around the year 2001, I drove down on a whim from Seat­tle to cen­tral Ore­gon — an area that would lat­er become known for cults and mili­ti­a­men, but at the time was most­ly just a blank space on the map to me. I want­ed to explore, take a few pho­tos, and find a place I remem­bered my grand­fa­ther once talk­ing about, called Steens Moun­tain.

At the end of the sec­ond day, bar­rel­ing down the back­side of that moun­tain toward my motel room and a show­er and a bed, a side road flashed into my periph­er­al vision and then was gone. Some­thing about it grabbed me; I slammed on my brakes and went back to snap this picture.

This remains a favorite pho­to and a favorite mem­o­ry — one of those times I ven­tured out on my own to nowhere in par­tic­u­lar, just to see what I could see.