A few years back, we wrote an article all about the geological wonder of Fort Rock and the incredible surrounding high desert area of Eastern Oregon’s “outback” country. In 2022, we had the opportunity to book a tour of one of the most interesting and historic sites in the entire Pacific Northwest.

This is my photographic journal of this wondrous place, but we need to place one caveat here before I continue.

Oregon State Parks now (as of 2026) prohibits photography inside the cave or on the tour itself, so I consider myself extremely fortunate to have been able to document our journey.

Fort Rock Cave at a Glance

Is Fort Rock Cave Inside of Fort Rock Itself?

Despite the name, Fort Rock Cave isn’t tucked inside the great horseshoe of cliffs that gives Fort Rock its familiar outline. It occupies a separate rock formation in the vicinity, while Fort Rock itself is a volcanic tuff ring formed through the explosive interaction of hot magma and water.

They belong to the same fascinating landscape, but visiting one doesn’t automatically mean you’ve visited the other. For trip planning, keep the walk around Fort Rock separate from the reserved cave tour, and give yourself time to appreciate both.

Our 9am tour began with a short ride by shuttle from Fort Rock itself to a dirt road leading off into the distance. The official name for our destination is actually “Cow Cave“, by 20th Century standards. It’s unknown what native peoples would have called it, but we’ll refer to it by both names for the remainder of this article.

The tribes who made their homes in the Fort Rock area were the ancestors of the Klamath, Modoc, and Paiute. According to Klamath tribal history, the “Yahooskin-Paiute bands, known simply as mukluks and numu (“the people”) occupied the area east of Yamsay Mountain, south of Lakeview, and north of Fort Rock. Everything they needed for happiness and survival was provided by The Creator and contained within these lands.“

A quarter-mile hike through sage and rabbitbrush leads to the rocky overhang of Cow Cave jutting out over a dark recess. Today the only inhabitants are barn swallows, bats, jackrabbits, and rodents, but some 10,000 years ago, this rocky cavern would have been used by humans as a shelter, meeting place, or perhaps home.

To put things in perspective, ancient indigenous Oregonians were residing here before the pyramids were built. That’s awe-inspiring in itself.

The floor of the cave is bedrock and dust, but at one time it was filled with layers of various earthen strata that are still visible in the walls.

Our guide from Oregon State Parks, Hannah, was both friendly and informative. The wealth of knowledge and native legend she imparted to us was extraordinary.

The Sandal in The Cave

In the 1930s, University of Oregon archaeologist Dr. Luther Cressman saw Cow Cave as something unique. He could never have known that what he uncovered would change modern archaeology forever.

“We excavated one of the Fort Rock Caves in 1938. Down below, the old lake bed was white with alkali in the blazing August sun. Dust devils swirled across miles of shimmering space in the dancing heat mirage. The accumulated refuse of centuries, rodent droppings, dust, ash, all had a characteristic stench that clung to the nostrils, as did the dust to our sweaty bodies.”

“As we dug, we went through a bed of volcanic ash from [the] ancient eruption [of Mt. Mazama] and suddenly, under this, came upon a sandal. It was made of a rope of twisted sagebrush bark, unlike any we had ever found. Many more came to light, about 75 in all, every one charred by fires set by the pumice as it fell. Between the ropes of the soles of some of these sandals was caked mud, burned red by the heat of the pumice fires. The wearers did not look on swirling dust devils, as we did on that hot August day, but on a great lake with wavelets lapping against a beach below the cave.” –Luther Cressman, The Sandal and the Cave

Cressman also had to wait for science to catch up with his discovery. When his crew excavated the sandals in 1938, radiocarbon dating hadn’t yet been developed, and his belief that they were ancient met with skepticism. In 1951, testing of the sandal fibers confirmed an age of more than 9,000 years. It’s easy to imagine his satisfaction at finally having a measurement to support what he had been arguing for years.

The Skill Behind the Sagebrush Sandals

Look closely at one of these replicas and the workmanship becomes as interesting as the age of the originals. Sagebrush bark was worked into fibers and cordage, then twined into a closely woven sole with a flap covering the toes. The construction required the maker to change the spacing and arrangement of the fibers as the shoe took shape, rather than simply weaving one flat piece and tying it on. There is a great deal of knowledge in that little sandal, beginning with how to turn a desert plant into something useful enough to wear on your feet.

The wear on the originals may be the most affecting detail of all. Many were broken or worn through, suggesting that their owners had discarded them after getting all the use they could from them. Archaeologist Thomas Connolly describes soles worn at the balls of the feet and little marks on the toe flaps left by sparks from a hearth. For all the distance between their lives and ours, a worn-out shoe is wonderfully easy to understand.

The Fort Rock sandals are the oldest directly-dated footwear in the world, and these locations have some of the originals in their collections (be sure to contact them before you go, if viewing the sandals is your main interest, and current displays can’t be guaranteed):

• The University of Oregon Museum of Natural & Cultural History, Eugene
• The Klamath County Museum, Klamath Falls
• The Oregon Historical Society Museum, Portland
• The Nevada State Museum, Carson City, Nevada

The University of Oregon’s Museum of Natural and Cultural History mentioned above, does currently feature the sandals in the exhibit, Oregon—Where Past is Present. The museum is at 1680 East 15th Avenue, making this a much easier stop for anyone who can’t arrange a cave tour. Its displays place the sandals within a broader account of Oregon’s human history and the continuing cultures of the state’s Tribes. Seeing the footwear in person would make a wonderful companion to visiting the landscape where it was found.

What Else Besides Ancient Sandals?

Besides the sandals, many other artifacts were found in Cow Cave including Native American tools, campfire remnants, and coprolites (fossilized human poop!).

The sandals understandably get most of the attention, but the cave’s other discoveries help fill in the picture of everyday life. Archaeologists also recovered a handheld grinding stone, chipped-stone scrapers, and a stone projectile point. Archaeologist Thomas Connolly suggests Fort Rock Cave may have served as a winter residence, with a smaller shelter constructed inside to conserve warmth and keep out cold winds. We can’t reconstruct every detail of that household, but it’s a fascinating possibility to consider while looking into the cavern.

How an Ancient Lake Shaped Fort Rock Cave

It takes a little imagination to put water back into this view. Near the end of the Ice Age, waves driven across a large lake in the Fort Rock Basin gradually hollowed the cave into the soft rock. By the time people were living here, the great lake had receded, leaving smaller lakes, ponds, and marshes that supported waterfowl, other game, and edible plants. The dry country in these photographs would have looked very different to people whose lives depended on those wetlands.

The cave’s human history also extends beyond the people who left those ancient sandals behind. Small fragments of twined basketry have been dated to within the past 5,000 years, indicating that people returned long after its best-known period of occupation. Those later visits appear to have been relatively brief, rather than evidence of an uninterrupted, permanent home. There’s something insanely remarkable about a shelter remaining useful to people across such an enormous span of time.

he surrounding country has a rich, more recent Northern Paiute history as well. Historical accounts of Christmas Lake Valley describe people gathering edible plants and hunting game, with communal jackrabbit drives providing both food and hides. Those drives also brought different bands together, making them social gatherings as well as a way to feed people. It’s worth remembering that the country we might casually describe as empty on a road trip was a homeland, understood through generations of living and working within it.

Post-Cave-Tour Side Trips

1. Crack In The Ground

As it was still early in the day, we explorers unanimously decided another adventure was needed. After a quick lunch of burgers and BLTs at Fort Rock Restaurant and Pub, we loaded up and headed 19 miles south to Christmas Valley’s Crack-In-The-Ground.

If you choose to undertake this journey, a 4×4 is highly recommended.

Crack-In-The-Ground doesn’t look especially impressive from satellite imagery, but approach it from ground level and you’re suddenly transported into a bizarrely silent world of strange lava flows and skylight caves.

The ancient volcanic fissure is two miles long, 15 feet wide, and up to 70 feet deep in some parts. Hiking through it brings some level ground, but also rocky scrambles to climb over and down. The temperature is around 20° F cooler than surface level, so be sure to bring a warm hat, jacket, and good hiking shoes with traction. On our visit, there was still snow and ice trapped on the floor of the Crack.

Crack-in-the-Ground deserves a little planning of its own, even when it’s the second adventure of the day. The Bureau of Land Management rates the trail as moderate and warns that the rugged dirt access roads can become impassable, with four-wheel drive highly recommended. There is no drinking water at the site, so bring what you’ll need rather than counting on filling a bottle when you arrive. Check conditions before committing to the drive, and leave yourself enough daylight to enjoy the walk without rushing back over uneven ground.

2. The Fort Rock Homestead Village Museum

For another look at life in the valley, the Fort Rock Homestead Village Museum brings together a collection of historic buildings in the small community of Fort Rock.

These are actual buildings relocated from surrounding homesteads and settlements, rather than some kind of cheesy, Old West backdrop constructed to entertain tourists. The historical society opened the museum in 1988 and continued rescuing structures that might otherwise have disappeared, including some that were scheduled to be razed or burned.

After looking at all the old abandoned houses out on the landscape, beautiful as they are in their varying states of decay, it’s encouraging to see what can survive when people decide it’s worth the trouble.

A self-guided walk through the village takes in homes, the old Fort Rock Mercantile, a doctor’s office, a church, and a schoolhouse. The Sunset School dates to 1912, while St. Rose Catholic Church was built in 1918 and later moved from the Fleetwood area to the museum grounds. Anyone with a weakness for old buildings and the lives once lived inside them should probably allow more than a quick roadside stop. The museum is at 64696 Fort Rock Road and operates seasonally, so check its opening dates before adding it to your cave-tour plans.

3. Exploring More of Christmas Valley

Christmas Valley itself has a backstory worth knowing before you drive through.

This small community in northern Lake County occupies part of an enormous ancient lake bed, but much of the modern town began with a California developer’s resort ambitions in the early 1960s. Construction included an airstrip, golf course, lodge, and artificial lake, all intended to attract people to a new life or vacation home in the high desert. The development never became the resort its promoter envisioned, but the roads and buildings remained, and a community gradually grew around them

There’s also way more to explore around Christmas Valley than one afternoon will comfortably hold. For those of you who assume this is just one big empty area in Oregon’s high desert landscape, you’d be seriously mistaken.

Beyond Crack-in-the-Ground, the Christmas Valley Sand Dunes form what the Bureau of Land Management identifies as the largest inland shifting sand dune system in the Pacific Northwest.

Nearby, the Lost Forest shelters an unusual stand of ponderosa pines, a remnant of a time when the climate was cooler and wetter. Christmas Valley is the nearest service community for that area, so make it your place to sort out supplies before heading farther afield. With this much to see, choosing another day to explore sounds a lot more appealing than racing the daylight back to the highway.

How to Book Your Own Tour of Fort Rock Cave

Fort Rock Cave can only be visited on a reserved Oregon State Parks guided tour. The park currently describes a season running from late April through mid- to late June, weather permitting, with dates released in two rounds beginning in January. Start with Oregon State Parks’ Fort Rock Cave information and check the available tour listings before making travel plans. For questions about the visit, the park information number is 541-536-2428.

When booking, confirm the meeting location, walking distance, terrain, and any accessibility needs with park staff. Our 2022 visit included a shuttle ride followed by a walk to the cave, but that account should not substitute for the instructions supplied with a new reservation. Wear suitable walking shoes and plan around the tour you actually book, especially when adding another destination afterward.

It would be awfully easy to turn a Fort Rock visit into a few days on Oregon’s back roads. Our Eastern Oregon travel guide is a good starting point for exploring more of that wide-open country, while our Central Oregon guide can help with the Bend and Sunriver portion of the trip. For another place to stretch your legs along the way, browse our Oregon hiking guide. Just leave some breathing room in the itinerary, because a cave tour and one well-chosen side trip can make a perfectly full day.