Days 14, 15, 16 - Oregon to Iowa

If I was still in second grade writing stories about my experiences, this story would sound something like (except with many more grammatical errors):

I went to Oregon. It was very cool. There aren't a lot of people but there are many trees at first. Then you get to the desert mountains. They are cool too.



Antelope, Oregon.
Population 37.

Young Life's Washington Family Ranch (aka "Wildhorse Canyon").
Former property inhabitants: The Rajneesh cult.

Wildhorse canyon is located about a half hour from the nearest town, which is Antelope. Most of that half hour is spent driving on the roadway owned by Young Life which leads into the camp. It isn't surprising that the roadway is so long, as the size of the property is 65,000 acres, big enough to fit every other Young Life camp inside of it twice.

As far as geography is concerned, Wildhorse Canyon is probably a few thousand feet above sea level. Everything is brown: dirt and rocks, and there are many rolling mountains. A river determines one edge of the property. Cattle are free to roam throughout the mountains. There is an artificial lake and many long dirt roads.

Before I begin explaining the Rajneesh, let me tell you that I will probably make some errors in my description. Google "Osho" or "Rajneesh" to learn more. There are also some great videos of former Rajneesh members returning to Wildhorse Canyon for a tour after Young Life took over.

Basically, there's all of this land that nobody wants in the middle of Oregon, so this one dude is like, "Hey, what a great opportunity to start a cult." So this Osho guy convinces himself that he is God and wants to start his own civilization. Somehow he convinces very smart people (i.e. lawyers, doctors, etc) to give up their lifestyles and move onto his land. Here, the quality of their housing is determined by how much they donate to the cause of this new culture. So what did Osho do with all of his income that his teachings and charisma had acquired? He set out to buy one Rolls-Royce for each day of the year. He would drive these each day to a town an hour away for a milkshake.

Wanting to really advance this new society he had cultivated, a shopping malls was created. Better facilities were made. His people, the Rajneesh, were complete self-sufficient, being so smart. They used intense irrigtaion methods and raised their own crops on less-than-convenient soil. The group found many ways to dodge government officials. For example, to avoid breaking housing laws, they built homes on bars, arguing that the homes were portable and could be lifted. Thus, they weren't real houses. Every loophole in legislation was utilized. They realized though, that if they wanted to accelerate their status as a civilization, they would have to elect their own candidate for a government position. To raise support and get more votes for their candidate, the Rajneesh drove to cities like Portland and brought back homeless people, giving them tiny A-frame homes and something to eat so that they could register. This still wasn't enough. They had to knock off a few of their opponents as well, so what did they do? Ask them politely to leave the state? No. Declare civil war? No. They cultivated salmonella. Rajneesh membrs then took this to restaurants, placing it in the food, hoping to make people sick so they would not be able to show up for elections. This is where the government caught the cult in action, and the giant property was seized.

Enter Mr. Washington, a billionaire. He decides to buy the property off of the government as a side project, hoping to create a resort for hunters. After all, there are many buildings that he could use and the land is plentiful. None of his proposed projects pass with the government, but Young Life catches on to whath e's doing and flies Mr. Washington out to some of their other camps to show him what they are about. He donates the land to them. They make a huge camp to show Christ to young people.

Here are some videos about the aforementioned:







Brian and Elise, two married interns at the camp where we stayed, explained that one day the Young Life staff had been praying about which buildings to use. Hours after praying over Osho's private residence, the house was struck by lightning and burned to the ground.

Brian showed us around the camp. We saw the rec building, fully equiped with gyms, rock walls, a professional-sized skatepark (with foam pit), basketball courts, volleyball courts, etc. It's the biggest building of its kind in the US. He then showed us the many many many vacant buildings, enough to hold a few thousand people. Included in these buildings was Osho's garages for his Rolls-Royces. In one garage, there were two firetrucks (male staff are trained because if there was ever a fire, the nearest fire company would not be able to arrive for hours). More firetrucks were located in another building.

Brian and Elise were hospitable and welcoming and made wicked good food. I also got to play a guitar for the first time in too long. That was rewarding. We all wished we could've stayed longer, but we certainly didn't rush leaving.

However, we did eventually leave, beginning our trek to Iowa. I drove all day and part of the night when we left, 6.5 hours all the way through Rt 26 in Oregon. It was icy through the mountain passes, but one thing that refreshed me as I kept driving toward Idaho was the view of O'Rion (sp?) straight ahead to the east. It was a relief to reach the interstate and had the wheel to Mike. It was nice to see civilization and not-so-curvy-and-more-than-one-lane roads.

I woke up in Utah outside of the Salt Lake and saw some majestic mountains, one with a train traveling around it, a great night sighting. Wyoming was more bland than I expected, but I was mostly tired. In the early morning, I started driving again, making it to a Chick-Fil-A in Cheyanne just as breakfast was ending. I then drove more (12+ hours of driving already for me alone), through Nebraska, which has to be the most boring state thus far. At least Kansas had oil wells and windmills and stuff. The only thing Nebraska has is tumbleweed. They don't even really have towns. Just tumbleweed and occasionally animals grazing. We couldn't find the Chick-Fil-A listed online in Omaha so we ate Taco Bell.

We finally made it to Cedar Rapids, Iowa to stay with Paul's relatives, completing our longest straight shot of driving, over 30 hours. It's so good to be laying on a sofa typing this, rather than in a seat in the Audi. I'm going to try to sleep now for three hours before I have to wake up and drive home tomorrow.

I'm ready to go back to school. I'm ready to see family and friends and be comfortable. Normally I'm completely against comfort. I'm often almost bitter about comfort. But this time, I'm going to sleep and eat and hang out and breathe and do everything I want for myself. Although I would've loved to spend more time adventuring, I'm also ready to go home. I'm ready to appreciate things and people I love, and experience these things and people like before.

So....15 more hours of driving tomorrow.