Easy Trails in the Painted HIlls

Where we went and why

Yesterday, we went to the Painted Hills in Oregon. We've wanted to go there for a bit, but we just hadn't made it there yet. We both took the day off of work and decided to go.

How to get there

The park is 47 miles east of Prineville on HWY 26. There is a big sign that tells you when to go left and another one when you need to go left again. 

The Trails

Overlook Trail

The Overlook Trail is 1/4 mile. It goes go uphill, but it's not very steep. It's totally worth the walk to the top. There are some benches along the way that you can rest at if you need to. We took a ton of pictures up there. The path is packed dirt. According to the screen shot below, the trail only has a 13 foot elevation gain, but that makes no sense to me since the min altitude was 2081 and the max was 2151. I wish this app had the elevation and pace chart like MapMyHike. I couldn't use Map My Hike because of the lack of Internet.

The Carroll Rim Trail

We didn't do the Carroll Rim Trail. The parking area is right at the beginning of the road to go to the Overlook Trail. There aren't many spots to park, but there wasn't anyone there when we got there. The trail winds around up a hill. The sign says that it's 3/4 of a mile one way. 

Painted Cove Trail

I think this was my favorite trail. It's definitely worth the walk around the whole trail. It's pretty flat. You can get close enough to one of the hills that you can touch it. There were informational signs all the way around the trail. This trail was about 1/4 mile. Most of the trail is on hard packed dirt, but part of the trail is on a fiberglass walkway. 

Leaf Hill Trail

This trail wasn't the most interesting trail, but there were some nice views. The trail was about a 1/4 mile. It was pretty flat. There was a big pile of stuff that was fenced off. There were signs talking about fossils. I didn't read all of the signs. There were some pretty flowers along the trail. While we were stopped looking at the pile of potential fossils, a giant bugged landed on my arm. I apparently freeze when I'm terrified. I didn't recognize the bug and wasn't sure if it was some poisonous creature that was going to bite me and kill me! I just kept telling my husband that there was a giant bug on me. He then came to the rescue and blew on it. It then jumped over to the fence and started at me while I took it's picture. Crisis averted. If you are going to skip any of the trails, this would be the one to skip.

Red Hill Trail

This trail was an out and back. At the beginning of the trail, it looks like a loop. There was a sign pointing to the right, but there was also a trail to the left. We went to the right and discovered that it was an out and back. The trail climbed up hill a little bit, but it was pretty gentle. The Red Hill was gorgeous. There was a bench at the top of the trail and a sign letting us know that it was the end of the trail. I saw the cutest little lizard at the start of the trail!

The Video

If you like the pictures, check out my Painted Hills YouTube video. (I edited the URL since my first video was pulled because it was too long) 

BodyMedia Screen Shot

I didn't do a workout tab for each of the hikes since they were so short, but here is the screen shot from the website that shows the calories per minute.