Bend, revisited...

I joined Gabe and his mom, sister and nieces and nephew in Bend this last weekend for a stay at the Inn at the 7th Mountain. I had never stayed there before, but we really enjoyed ourselves. We had a nice room with a good kitchen, and plenty of room for all 7 of us! We had a nice little balcony that was really private, and we enjoyed hearing the river and watching the chipmunks run around from it. The Inn has every sort of activity you could ever imagine! They have a few nice pools and hot tubs, as well as tennis, basketball and miniature golf. They even have a roller skating rink, but you have to rent the skates. We decided to do a little guided rafting tour, and we were all glad we did. We organized it through the Inn, and it was worth the $40, because our guide, Travis, was really good. The kids were all really nervous to go, but ended up having a fabulous time. This is a stretch of the Deschutes River I had never been on and has two 3 plus rapids, that were a pretty good ride! The kids all sat in the nose of the boat on their knees holding onto the rope and definitely got the wettest, and they loved it! Travis did funny tricks off the side of the boat, backflips and what not, and was really good with the kids. He also sat the kids on the very nose of the boat holding on to a rope, he called it the "bucking bronco". For how nervous the kids were in the beginning I was impressed with how they cut loose and let themselves really have a great time and enjoy it. I felt like the trip was too short, but we really did have a great time.
Travis, our guide works for Silver Moon brewing company, a local beer brewery in Bend, so we went to the bar at the Inn that night for a taste of what he was talking up so much during our trip. Gabe, his mom, and sister all tried it (I'm not a huge beer fan!), and they all said they really liked it. Right now you can only get it in Central Oregon apparently, although they're trying to make their way to Portland at some point. The bartender in the bar was really nice and we enjoyed chatting with him.
All in all, I think whether you have a family, or if you don't, the Inn at the 7th Mountain is a fun place to go to for a weekend or longer. There's so much that Bend has to offer now that you can't go wrong!
PS If you happen to drive through Sisters at 5am, like I did, and are in desperate need of some caffeine, I recommend this little coffee stand on the NE side of town, I had the most amazing white mocha ever!! They had the little ground up turd ice instead of the big chunks of ice :)