Pacific Ocean

Sitting here on the beach in Lincoln City, OR.  The ocean is so blue and pretty today. 

Balloon Festival and Art Show in Albany, OR

Today was spectacular!!  I actually got out of bed and was dressed by 6:45 AM so I could watch the 40 colorful balloons ascending into a perfectly beautiful sky today.

 

 I'm not sure if I ever want to ride in one even though it is on my bucket list.  The fire they use to get it going bothers me. 

 

 

 

It was great that I could get up close to watch how they prepare for take off.

 

 

Up, up and away!

 

 

 

 

There goes Smokey.  Hope he figures out how to take care of all the fires while he is up there.

 

 

More Wine Tasting and Llamas

This was the last day of camping with the Oregon Lows and I had to decide where I was going from Hood River and what my new adventure was going to be.  I decided maybe I needed to take in a few wineries and more wine tasting so I could think clearly.

Phelps Creek Winery

Mt. Hood Winery.  This beautiful bar was bought on Ebay.
 

The Gorge White House.  This was the best!  The tasting room is inside a 1908 Dutch Colonial home in the heart of the Hood River Valley and is an historical land mark. 

This winery is family owned.  The young woman handling the tasting room is a niece of the owner.  She teaches 2nd grade during the school year but works here through the summer.  Many of the wineries in Oregon are family owned. 

I then moved on to the Cascade Llama Farm.  I had really been looking forward to this as I have never seen llamas close up.   This is a mama nursing her baby.

 

They are cute little guys but also kind of strange looking too.

 

 

Look at this sweet baby.  They are very gentle and like to be petted.

 

 

I caught this one yawning.

 

 

Their wool is much softer than sheep's wool.  There is a yarn shop on the premises with yarn in every color imaginable.  I bought a couple of skeins and am inspired now to knit a scarf.  We'll see how that goes.

 

 

As I was leaving, I had to get one last shot of these interesting creatures grazing.  They come in lots of different colors.

 

  

Get Together With Oregon LOWS - Hood River, OR

Today, I met up with 12 members of the Oregon chapter of  LOWS at the Hood River Fairground RV Park for 4 days.  It was a great outing and an opportunity for me to learn more about the state of Oregon and what it has to offer.  Most of these members have lived here all there lives and say, "Why would I want to live anywhere else?"  And I can see why they feel this way.

However, this particular week saw its share of forest fires which put a haze over the normally beautiful landscape plus did a number on my sinuses.

One day we toured the Western Antique Aeroplane & Automobile Museum.  It had a very interesting collection of vintage automobiles and airplanes, as well as vehicles used in the wars.

I chose this Cadillac as the one I would like to have had back in the day or even in this day.

Some of us decided to go wine tasting after our museum trip.  Here we are at Wy'East Winery.
Because it was almost in the 3 digits heatwise this day, we only took in one winery even though there are several in the area.

 

 

 

Silver Falls State Park-Oregon

Yesterday was my last day in the park in  Silverton, OR and I had to decide which way I wanted to go.  I found out the OR Lows were meeting up at Hood River and since I liked it there the week before, I decided to join them.  Since I would meet up with them on Sunday, I had a day to go somewhere else so I decided to spend the night in Silver Falls State Park.  I'm so glad I went there as it is definitely Oregon's best kept secret.  It is a beautiful park with 10 different waterfalls, plus ranger programs, cafes, hiking trails, lots of wildlife (seven different species of owls) which you can hear at night.

   
I went to one of the falls, South Falls, and watched people walk under it.  The falls are not as beautiful as they normally are because of the hot summer and thus a drought that Oregon is experiencing. 

On my drive to the park, I noticed the landscape was very different this year than it was from when I was here in OR two years ago.  Oregon normally has lots of rain but not so much this year and they badly need it.  OR is still one of the prettiest states I've seen.

 

Silver Falls State Park is a great gathering place for families, friends, anybody.  Lots of activity going on this Sunday.  I observed this church service along with singing. 

 

 

Lots of families enjoying the swimming area.

 

 

Silverton, OR

Now I am settled in Silverton, OR for a week.  I stayed here two years ago and remembered how interesting this little town was. 

There are lots of painted murals on the buildings,  throughout the downtown area, depicting historical events. 

 

Love the beautiful flowers in this state.  These hanging baskets are everywhere.  Could not have these in TX. 

 

 

So I am having dinner in this outdoor café and I saw someone who I think could have been Anthony Bourdain.  I never did find out if it was.  My waitress had never heard of him so she was of no help.  Before I knew it, he was gone.  He is one of my favorite people.  I watch his program on CNN whenever I can. 

The RV park I am staying at is very nice and some of the RVers gather here every night for happy hour.  Most say they came here to OR to get away from the heat but this year OR is almost as hot as anywhere. 

 

Hood River, OR

When we drove down along the Columbia River, returning from our trip, we went through Hood River, OR.  I decided to return there for the day.  It was a busy place with swimmers, parasailers, windsurfers, etc.  Fascinating to watch the windsurfers especially. 

 

They had some pretty fancy sails.

 

 

Lots of beach combers.

 

Farmer's Market, Forest Grove, OR

Forest Grove has a weekly farmer's market with lots of fresh produce, wine, art, etc. 

Here is Tami buying flour made out of corn. 

And of course we visited a wine bar of which there are many in this state....one of the things I like about Oregon. 

 

 

Home to Oregon

We headed back to OR yesterday, stopped and spent the night in Coeur d'Alene, ID.  We traveled along the Columbia River a good part of the way.  We thought the haze we were seeing was from the Glacier fire or the Northern CA fires but as we got closer to Arlington, OR, we saw a grass fire across the Columbia River on the Washington side.  We could actually see the flames.

World Museum of Mining, Butte MT

We decided to head back to OR through Butte, MT up through North ID, through Spokane, WA and on home.  While in Butte, we visited the World Museum of Mining and took an underground tour of the Orphan Girl Mine which produced silver, lead and zinc from 1875 until 1956.

Here is our tour guide showing us how the miners entered the mine through a shaft.  Interestingly, they even dropped donkeys down through the narrow door in a straight jacket in order to get them down.  Once down in the shaft, the poor donkeys never came back up or saw daylight again.  They were used to move the heavy cars, loaded with ore, along the tracks of the mine

Here, Nick is being fitted with a belt with a battery attached that will keep his lantern on the front of his helmet lit while we are underground.  The lights will be our only source of light.

 

Now he is fitted with his lantern.

 

 

Ready to go and face the unknown!

 

Hard to take pictures in the mine but it was very interesting.  Touring the mine made one realize how exhausting and dangerous the life of a miner must have been.

 

 

Another part of the museum had a huge mineral display and a collection of detailed doll houses and dolls.

 

On the grounds was also a reconstructed old mining town, complete with a Chinese laundry, church, school, general store, saloon, blacksmith, dentist and doctor offices, etc.  It all looked so authentic, I felt like I was back in time.