Dear everyone,
This will be a two-parter, with part one our trip to Oregon,
and part two the continuation of New Mexico and Colorado.
Day 1 Friday
We leave Chicago in a big rainstorm. One of those storms where you can barely see
out of the windshield, especially if you are at just the correct angle behind
some other vehicle. Our Lyft driver’s car also stinks of either tobacco, or
marijuana, or both, but he does get us to the airport safely.
The days before our departure Cindy had more anxiety than
usual because someone had rented a car from Enterprise in Ashville, North
Carolina using a fake IL Driver’s License with her name/address/birthdate, but
not any of her credit card accounts. She
only found out because a rental agreement was emailed to her (probably due to
being in the system from previous rentals, because the email and phone number
on the reservation were not hers). She put a freeze on her accounts, reported
the identity theft to the local PD and had multiple discussions with the car
rental company. The rental was a 7
person van, and we wondered what illegal thing was being smuggled using it.
Cigarettes? Alcohol? Guns? People? We will never know if the vehicle was
returned.
At O’Hare our departure was delayed because we were waiting
for a flight attendant. Still, our
flight to Denver was uneventful, and we had an early dinner at the
airport. We were upgraded to first class
to Eugene, and were offered a second dinner as well! Nikki and Wes picked us up in Eugene. Nikki had purchased some pastries from Sweet Life, the shop next to her
house for a breakfast snack for me - - a
pecan bun, and a slice of ‘cowgirl’ quiche – both stayed edible in our Airbnb’s
refrigerator over the next few days. We
took backroads to our small cottage that was nestled up near Skinner Butte.
Day 2 Saturday
After my breakfast snack was done, Cindy went outside for some air, and was surprised by a small flock of wild turkeys. The males were quite aggressive and displaying at each other, and pecking their reflections in car doors.
Wes and
Nikki came to pick us up, and we drove to the Eugene Saturday Market. Wes
and the girls bought some focaccia for brunch, and we bought some gifts for Tim
and Diana - - spices (powdered hatch chili, and some other powdered chili), and
a bottle of passion fruit curd. I got some fish and chips, which was not as
good as what I had eaten the previous year. We looked at tie dyes, ceramic
pottery, and other artisanal products. Wes
left to go to a departmental party, and the three of us walked to the public
library, which appears well endowed. The
upper floor had been used by other governmental offices, but the library had
taken them over, and was in the process of renovating them. The library has an extensive seed bank, and a
library of things as well. After 5 years
of continuing to use her Chicago Public Library card to take digital loans, Nicola
finally got a library card for this facility.
We rested a bit in the Portal
Tea shop, dropped off some stuff at Nikki and Wes’s house, and then walked
to the Eugene
Owen rose garden. Wes’s party was
over by this time, so he met us there, and we walked along the Willamette and
saw a couple of swallow species, vultures, pine siskins, and lesser goldfinch.
It was time for dinner, and we went to the nearby Caribbean
restaurant, Yardy Rum Bar. We got there just in time - - they don’t take
reservations, and we snagged the last larger table. There was a long waiting line when we left.
We had some interesting food and drinks, including a jerked beet salad, green
pea fritters, empanada, chicken tamarind sandwich, and oxtail stew with coconut
rice. For dessert we had a chocolate
cake and a lime-coco cake. One
interesting drink was Mauby
soda, served with a shot of absinthe on the side.
Cindy and I returned to our lodgings, and watched a really terrible Polish movie on Netflix called The Inheritance. Reviewers in Poland said “it is neither funny nor decently conducted - the story has gaps and is not engaging, the script is a mess, there are bizarre dialogues and stale jokes, and the characters lack depth." If only we had known! We kept watching it, hoping for some redeeming quality to show up. It only got worse as it went on.
Day 3 Sunday
We had brunch at the Acorn
Café, a community café next door to Sweet Life. The food was ok, I thought the best thing was
the ‘bunny Mary’, a concoction of carrot juice, habanero honey, caper brine and
lemon. I had it without alcohol! The we drove east along the Mckenzie river,
passing through the Holiday
Farm fire - - almost 200,000 acres burnt down; this was one of the largest fires in Oregon history. Plants
are regrowing; however. We drove up into the untouched Willamette National Forest,
and walked the exciting Sahalie
and Koosah Falls loop. Sahalie falls
is 100 feet high, while Koosah is about 65, and the two are within a mile or so
of each other. It’s a pretty nice hiking
trail on both sides of the river. We saw
fairy slippers, Western trillium, stream violets, boreal chickadees, and
Stellars jays. Wes liked standing near
the high banks of the river, and sometimes resembled a figure that Casper David Friedrich
could have painted, or that Wagner was thinking of when creating sonic
masterpieces.
After our hike we drove to the Coburg pizza company for dinner. They had some unusual varieties. We had a triple pepperoni (to make sure Wes
had something normal before his trip to Papua New Guinea), smoked pork with
apple, and a grilled sweet onion pie.
Before heading back to bed we stopped at Eugene’s Salt
and Straw. I remember there was a
salted grapefruit (too salty for me), plus a lot of other unusual flavors.
Day 4 Monday
After finishing off my leftover pastries, we were picked up
by Wes and Nikki, and deposited at the train station. We took the Amtrak train to Portland. We had tickets for upper-level seats, and the
conductor assigned us specific ones just outside the train. We lugged our luggage up the narrow spiral
stairs, and down the corridor to see that someone else was in one of the two
seats! I went down to talk to the
conductor, and he looked at his floor plan, and said, try these two
instead. They were also occupied! Down
I went again, and he said to take the two seats at the front of the car - -
luckily, they were free. Otherwise, it was a smooth, quiet ride, and we could
see some snow-capped peaks in the west, perhaps Mount Washington. There were
lots of ranches and farms.
Tim and Diana picked us up at the train station, and we
drove to their house in NE Portland. We
drove east along 84 to Bridal
Veil falls and Latourell
falls. You could see Mount Hood, but I wasn’t able to get a picture. I was
astonished at how wide the Columbia River was; I had never really seen it
before when I had been to Portland. It rivals the engineered width of the Mississippi.
I saw chestnut backed chickadees, Camas and Deathcamas, and Mitrewort.
On our return to Portland, we stopped at Vista
House, and admired the view. Back home, Tim baked salmon, and Diana made a large
salad. Before dessert we walked to a
nearby Salt and Straw to get some ice cream to eat with Diana’s rhubarb
crumble.
Day 5 Tuesday
After breakfast, we drove north to Washington to the Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. This is a big migratory bird hot spot. We first went to the visitor center area,
where there were a lot of school children, who were doing some program in a
reconstructed Chinook
plank house. Then we took the automobile
loop. Even though a lot of the waterfowl
migration had already taken place, there were many other bird species around -
- too many to list here. We were able to
get out and go to a viewing blind. The
interior was a nesting habitat for barn swallows, and some were right out the
window, holding nesting material, and looking angrily at us.
We drove back into Oregon, and took 84 again, all the way to
Cascade Locks, where we had
lunch at the Brigham Fish Market. I had halibut fish and chips - - a bit disappointing. Diana also got some fish
collars to share. We went to the Bonneville Fish Hatchery,
where we saw some enormous sturgeons (including Herman the Sturgeon,
over 10 feet long 500 pounds, and maybe 100 years old), and big trout. Driving back we took some hikes to see Multnomah falls and Wahclella falls.
Upon returning to Portland, we went to Bole Ethiopian, where the service was
surprisingly fast. Usually, you need to
wait 45+ minutes for the injera
to get made. Back at Tim and Diana’s, we
watched the first two episodes of Derry Girls.
Day 6 Wednesday
We went out to Pine State Biscuits for breakfast, and took Alaska Airlines to Albuquerque.
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