Went to Oregon for the Annual Gardenfish Party and managed to sneak in some unrelated sightseeing.
Before I even got on the plane to Portland, I had another trip, for work, to Huntsville, AL. Which meant that the day I went to Portland was my third straight day messing around with airports and all the attendant bravo sierra.
Going to Huntsville wasn't all that bad, other than the fact that I had to get up at an hour of the day I wasn't even aware actually existed. Once I got there, the rental place spent 20 minutes trying to find me a car, and handed me the key to something called a DTS, whatever the heck that is. They told me it was in slot A-14. So I grabbed my luggage, and stepped into the great outdoor sauna known as Huntsville In June. Comparable only to Huntsville In July and Huntsville In August. (This experience made the unseasonable Oregon weather far more tolerable; see what I mean about putting me in the proper frame of mind?)
Anyhow, on stepping out of the airport, I had the choice to go left or right for indoor or outdoor rental car parking. Hmmm, the folks at the desk did not say anything about which way to go... I'll try left. I eventually walked into the garage, then back the way I came (sweating all the while) inside the garage, only to find slot A14 and a Hummer was parked in it. Nope, not here. Back around the long way to outside, back to the sign, then off to the right and the outdoor lot. No slot A14, but lots of car alarms going off as people inadvertently tripped them. Or maybe not. It occured to me that maybe I could find the doggone car this way. I pushed the button and voila: nothing!
Back to the indoor parking! And there.... nothing!
Back into the airport to ask the people where they hid the car; and they ended up giving me the keys to a Toyota minivan. Sensible door lock! So off I went to where I was supposed to be, to spend some time preparing for the meeting the next day, at 8:30
The next day, the right front tire was completely flat.
Unfortunately all the people I knew at the building were not going to be in their offices; they would all be in a meeting room waiting for me. Fortunately I remembered the number for the front desk, so I called them and one of the other people in the meeting came and picked me up, and the meeting happened with only a half hour delay.
Time to come back home. The plan was to catch a 1:15 flight to Atlanta, sit on my butt for four hours there, then grab a connection to Colorado Springs. I got to the airport and discovered that long ago, the flight had been rescheduled to 2:20, and they had not bothered to tell me, so I got to waste an extra hour in an airport. I got to Atlanta just fine. Fortunately I had pre-arranged to meet people there (Vicki and Mike) during the layover so that was cool. I got back to the airport. The plane that was supposed to take us to Colorado Springs was delayed. And delayed again, and delayed yet again! It was two hours late. Interestingly enough--it came out of Huntsville! Now why the heck wasn't I on *that* plane instead of the one I flew to Atlanta on? Simple-- that flight was a hundred dollars more expensive or something like that, and it was against my employer's travel policy to pay for that. That's okay, he can pay me to read a book in an airport for four hours.
I was in the very back row for three of the four flights; and ironically one of the same flight attendants who was on the COS-ATL flight was on the ATL-COS flight, and she recognized me.
I got home very very late, and had to be at work on time the next morning--so I could get about four hours in before it was time to drive up to Denver to catch the flight to Portland. Sleep deprivation.
I happened to be in a window seat on the left side of the plane. This was a very good thing because we flew right past Mount Hood; it seemed close enough to touch. Too bad my camera was inaccessible. As we flew directly north of it, I could see three more peaks trailing off in the distance, almost a straight line. I thought they were Jefferson, Shasta and Lassen, but looking at a map, they were probably Jefferson, the Three Sisters (jumbled up so close together that they looked like one peak), and *maybe* Shasta--if not, I don't know what it could be. Lassen is way too far away and too short. The picture of the plane on the map below is about where it was when this happened; you can see Hood and Jefferson labeled. The Three sisters are just south of Jefferson; Shasta is off the bottom of the map. (Shasta is tall enough that it's still plausible that it is the one I was seeing in the furthest distance.)
Time to hop in the rental car (an Aveo) and head down to Corvallis, where I had found a hotel that was described as clean but basic.
Woke up early enough that I was able to walk around a bit; I stumbled upon the farmers' market and (after a quick cell phone call) bought some snap peas.
I got to start the drive to the barbecue by going off on a tangent. Or actually, through the town of Tangent.
I got to the barbecue about 20 minutes before it was supposed to start, not wanting to be too early, of course others were already there.
Yes, it was hot and humid, but nothing like Huntsville. Nevertheless the efforts of Hostess Tori to keep us hydrated were well appreciated!
I went through one quick round of picturetaking and I don't think at the time we even had all the people there yet--and Paul wasn't even in the Bite Me shirt yet.
A bunch of us; JanuaryGirl, Wobbles, Stacey, Spinner (back to the camera), under the
white canopy that we walked over from the park.
Stacey and Joyce (DizzJo)
Burd (Terry), with Earl (NaveAlta) in the foreground.
Joe (Wobbles) and JanuaryGirl (Come to think of it I don't think I know her real
name!)
Our esteemed GrandMaster Dumbass host, Paul.
After all the food (lots of it) and conversation (lots of it), time to head back to Corvallis.
The day began with the Breakfast at the Corner Cafe; I didn't get any pics but others have posted the group shot outside the door just afterwards. So I said goodbye to everyone here
...and would soon say hello to Terry and Earl once again. The rest of Sunday was going to be spent with Burd and Earl, first at the Raptor Sanctuary south of Eugene that Burd has talked so much about, then later we'd either do the coast or Silver Creek Falls.
So I drove to Eugene, and convoyed with them to the Cascades Raptor Center.
I took plenty of pictures of birds at the raptor center. It should be noted that many of these birds are at the raptor center because they have physical injuries, such as a missing eye or a broken wing that never healed properly, that will prevent them from ever surviving in the wild. The injuries will be evident in some of the pictures.
Prairie Falcon (quite native to where I live!).
A kite. One of Terry's favorites.
A Great Gray Owl named Gandalf. Terry tells me the story of this owl coughing up a pellet
in her presence on some previous visit; it almost looks like it's giving us the evil
eye for Terry having refused the pellet.
This is Juno, a Great Horned Owl.
A snowy owl. It was quite a challenge to get pictures without the mesh getting in the way.
I sometimes succeeded, more often failed. This picture was just barely worth
showing, mainly because the bird is so unusual looking, at least to me.
Bald eagle, offical bird of the United States of America. The Cascades Raptor Center
has three of them.
Terry and I aren't completely sure of this one; it's most likely a juvenile red tailed
hawk. This one was outside on a stand, getting people time. Some of the birds can be
handled (by Center volunteers); those
will have a leather strap tied to one of their feet, like this one does.
We then decided to do Silver Creek Falls. On the map, that is the trip up north to Albany, then east, then north, then down in that hook to the left. At least if I followed what was going on; it was confusing and Earl ended up taking the long way around because the signage was very misleading. (Absolutely NOT his fault!)
Now recall that I am from Colorado, which doesn't come with a lot of water, and certainly we don't get nice waterfalls or anything of that nature. The sight of water tumbling off a cliff because someone was foolish enough to leave it laying around on the ground is... a novelty to say the least.
The south falls. You can walk down a trail and actually go behind the falls; if you look closely you will see some people doing so.
It's so humid here that even the moss gets rusty.
Actually this is obviously some sort of funky lichen growing on the volcanic rock that these streams have been cutting their way through over the years.
The north falls. From the parking lot level, you cannot see behind the falls far enough to realize that you can walk behind these, too. It's a bit unnerving standing under a rock ceiling that juts out 50 feet or so past you. Bad place to be in an earthquake, let me tell you.
Well, that was it for gathering-related events. I said my goodbyes to Terry and Earl.
Back to the hotel through Salem.
My plan originally was to go up to see Mount St. Helens (or what's left of it after the little kaboom! back in the 70s), then possibly the scenic route paralleing I-84 east of Portland. But it occured to me that in all my peregrinations (sorry about that pun, Burd), I had never been west of Victoria, BC, and this was a good chance for me to fix that. So I headed for the coast. This is almost the furthest west I have ever been, now:
There are evidently rocks just below the surface where you see the surf; you can see the interference patterns between the two sets of whitecaps.
A point slightly north of here, on an anonymous stretch of highway, is about half a mile further west than this point, and is the furthest west I have ever been.
(For the record: Furthest East: Warsaw, Poland; Furthest North: Aarhus, Denmark; Furthest South, Montego Bay, Jamaica.)
At Tillamook I turned east towards Portland, planning to skirt around to the northwest and go to Mt. St. Helens. No such luck, however: I realized there would not be enough time to do that AND get on the plane. So I settled for the scenic drive east of Portland.
In hindsight I should have turned around after taking those pictures instead of spending so much time on those windy back roads. At least twice I zoomed up a road with a passing lane only to just fail to get around a camper at the very top--and be condemned to spend the next 20 minutes fuming behind the slowpoke.
Now I say "settled" for the scenic route east of Portland, but it was well worth the drive. (Thanks, Burd, for telling me about this!)
Looking west down the Columbia River. The red car at the bottom is my rental car.
The famous Multnomah falls. Big Deal, huh?
Look again, zoomed back out. Apparently these are the second-highest falls in North America.
I got as far as standing on the bridge before--the plane beckoned. Time to fly home.
In some respects this trip is not all I had hoped it would be last year--I certainly did not get to revisit Crater Lake or add more volcanos to the scoreboard. You can credit my ill-timed business trip to Huntsville for messing part of that up (since it prevented me from making it a driving expedition), and my sudden crazy desire to check out the coastline for the rest of it.
But the trip was helped *immensely* by Terry and Earl on Saturday; I would never have known about, much less seen, Silver Creek and the sanctuary without them. In any case I expect to be in the Portland area twice next year; assuming seasonal factors don't mess with me I will certainly be able to pick up Mt. St. Helens in April.