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Owyhee River Presentation

  • When Mar 12, 2016 from 02:00 PM to 04:00 PM (US/Pacific / UTC-800)
  • Where Grant County Library
  • Contact Phone 541-575-1992
  • Add event to calendar iCal

          The Owyhee River Journals by Bonnie J. Olin with Photographs by Mike H.   Quigley

Where: Grant County Library - 507 S Canyon Blvd, John Day, OR 97845

When:  Saturday, March 12, 2016 - 2 pm

              Presentation includes: 

              An opening slideshow as people arrive

              A talk which includes a brief history of the region, location information, and what makes this region special, and briefly, efforts to protect it.

              A short reading

              A 20 minutes video of a 2006 expedition into Deep Creek and the Owyhee River

              Q & A period

              Book Signing

The Owyhee River Journals is a self published book and it is considered a writing of record. The book project was entirely my own and it is my way of advocating for a place I know well, and love with all my being.  I have my husband, Mike Quigley, to thank for that, for he first introduced me to this river canyon in 1993.  He had been exploring these canyons since the mid 70’s.

The book came to fruition, in part, because I couldn’t find a book on the Owyhee that I was looking for - one bursting with full color photos showing all the stems of the river canyon including the most remote regions.  I wanted to share the Owyhee that I knew, first with family and friends, but eventually with everyone, to increase awareness of the area, in the hope that once people saw the unique beauty of these canyonlands, they might find it a special place worthy of preservation. But such a book did not exist. 

Photos were crucial for this project, and for that, I was again, deeply indebted to Mike Quigley, for allowing me to use his photos in the book. For what I lack in words to describe, I knew his photos would reveal.

To reach my audience, I developed a 50 minute presentation which includes my book, a slideshow and a movie, that together, will take the audience on a vicarious journey deep into the Owyhee Canyonlands. For seeing it, I believe, is the next best thing to being there.  The book includes an abundance of photographs that feature the entire river system and magnificent beauty of the inner canyon corridor.  The movie video titled “Deep Creek & the Owyhee River,” is a story of an expedition into the Owyhee canyon, by inflatable kayaks in 2006 that begins on a tributary of the East Fork of the Owyhee in Idaho, and ends at Three Forks, in Oregon.  It is a view of the upper regions of the Owyhee River that few people see, and helps one to understand the significance of this last hidden jewel of the West, for people will not find themselves in the Owyhee on their way to any other location. 

After spending 22 years exploring these canyons, kayaking the river and hiking the side canyons from river to rim numerous times with Mike, I can tell you from first hand experience that there are many reasons to protect this region. We Oregonians have a golden opportunity to protect a landscape like no other in these United States that could easily qualify for National Park status, as we have come to recognize that the desert is not a wasteland and the Owyhee is a unique jewel in all of these United States. This is what I hope to show my audience, to share this passion for place, to be a voice for the Owyhee.