For a Cubs fan the very worst type of Summer involves bullpen issues. When severe, it is simply too painful to watch games literally tossed away at the last possible moment that could easily have been won. Compound this with almost uniform under-performance by the big-time position players that the baseball-bloggers needed so so bad. The situation requires ignoring baseball altogether, placing ones focus elsewhere, which is actually pretty easy. We Cubs fans have developed the requisite skills over decades.
Below is a brief guide to exploring Oregon as a way to distance yourself from sport and team. Now Oregon has way too much cool stuff to visit on a just-shy-of-two-weeks endeavor. Figuratively cool stuff. Not literally cool stuff this year. Or literally cool for part of time. So this only pertains to the Columbia River Gorge around Hood River, Mount Hood itself, the Rose Garden in the City of Roses (how charming), the wine region south of Portland, and parts of the central coast around Lincoln City between Neskowin and Depot Bay.
Driving from and to Utah we hit Hood River twice. Just for an afternoon on the way in and a couple of days on the way out. On the way in we walked a little around the town, had dinner, and visited the river-front which is considered the place in the United States for windsurfing. I didn’t recognize any of the windsurfing equipment. The sport has totally changed. Change is the only constant or so they say. The scene is basically as expected. Large grass areas with dozens of people, maybe one hundred, assembling or disassembling their boards, or whatever they are called now. The breeze off the river was luscious. It was a little hot in town but the really hot part comes later.
Over the water with the brown and gray cliffs of Washington State serving as the background, dozens of kite-borders and wind-surfers were doing their thing. Some just gliding back and forth across the water. Others performing hijinks like vertical 360’s around their kites. I expected all of them to be in their 20’s and 30’s. Often when they reached shore they looked more in their 50’s. Hurray for them.
I have to recommend the Freshies Bagels at the bottom of Front Street. I am not a bagel guy. I’m pretty sure that they didn’t exist when I was growing up in Chicago. I had a regular turkey and avocado sandwich stuffed into a bagel. It took me a while to realize that the sandwich involved a bagel. I also had a glass of Pinot Noir. The combo was just about perfect. It was my first glass of Pinor Noir in Oregon on this trip so that could explain it. Having been turned on to Adelsheim by a friend and co-worker back in the middle-90’s, I have been an Oregon Pinot devotee ever since. The way I see it there is France and Oregon and then all the rest. Back in the day, Oregon Pinot was cheap. Not crazy cheap, but cheap. That movie, the evil movie, Sideways, has ruined everything. An early 90’s Mountain Dew commercial ruined Moab, Utah. And that movie ruined Pinot. I do love the movie. But I’ve gotten ahead of myself.
On the way back out at the end of the trip I took a quick gander at my phone’s weather app. 106 degrees expected for the next several days in Hood River. WHAT? Plans changed. Our spot in Hood River was on the river west of town. A wonderful place. A large complex of lawn and gardens separated us from the cliff overhanging the river. Our new plans involved the volcano and the shadows on the Oregon side of the river beneath the volcano, out of the extreme heat.
I had never been up near the top of Mount Hood or any of the other Pacific Northwest volcanos. Although I had done the wilderness areas of the North Cascades of Washington on horseback as a kid.
I knew there was a ski area up there somewhere. Timberline Lodge is a depression era (1937) WPA (Works Progress Administration) private / public resort which, now administered by the US Forest Service, boasts both the longest season and greatest vertical of all US resorts. Mid-September to the end of August if you include ski camps that operate from late May on. And just over 4,500 feet, 4,000 to 8,500 in the Winter.
The lodge looks a tad funky on the outside, perhaps a little restoration might be in order. The outside was featured in the movie: The Shining. The inside looks very similar to many of my favorite structures: the lodge at Zion, the Many-Glacier Hotel in Glacier, etc.
If you visit in mid-July the slopes are in minimal to moderate use by kids in summer ski camps and not operated as a conventional ski area to us regular day skier types. Most importantly the late-afternoon high temperature when we were there was around 90 when it was 106 down on the river.
Up at elevation we took some time exploring the lodge inside and out. On the Pacific Crest Trail, the lodge provides a resting spot for through-hikers and is also a hub for some rather extreme looking mountaineering routes to the top of the mountain. Several displays related to the history of mountain-climbing and Mount Hood are present in the lodge.
The lodge is the sort of place that makes you feel as though you are in a 1940’s black and white movie. In this case a movie about a world class skier training in Summer for the Olympics or perhaps a mountaineering expedition involving a women and three suitors that resulted in death or maybe murder. Or so says my imagination.
We then hit a short trail to a small lake which we didn’t complete because one of our pups petered out with the heat. It remained overly toasty even in the deep shadows of the forest.
We ended up on a Forest Sevice road that was signed as a route to Hood River from a place called Zigzag, excluding commercial trucks, but it grew increasingly dicey and ultimately reached a metal gate which we were free to pass but it was signed indicating gnarly beyond. So we spun around and ended up on the highway back to Portland. The detour did provide some great views of the top of the mountain.
Returning to Hood River on the main highway along the river (I-84) we took the old highway (Rt-30) which crosses many of several large waterfalls. Rt-30 is a splendid road with 30’s era white wooden and elaborate concrete guard rails all dappled in the soft light of the forest.
We visited an historic view center overlooking the river and then began the drive to each of the waterfalls. Most are visible from the road while others are visible after very short hikes. All are wonderful, but similar.
After a a second toasty night in Hood River we returned to continue our tour of the waterfalls with an I-84 roadside stop to view Multnomah falls. This now requires an inexpensive but pain-in-the-butt online permit. This waterfall is an iconic American photograph. So a must-do spot for a guy like me. The best light was just before the sun rose above the timber backdrop. Then we headed back again to Rt-30 for several more of the falls. It had grown pretty hot but the hikes were either short or non-existant.
On the way in, we left Hood River and drove straight to Portland to pick up daughter no. 1 who had been there over the weekend. She insisted on a quick drive up to the Portland Rose Garden. This is a sweet spot for a few photos. We then did our normal run to the coast often beginning at the airport involving several stops at wineries, roadside berry shops, and a Lincoln City supermarket where we could pick up some Oregon cheese and other staples for a week at a motel cabin with kitchen overlooking the beach and beyond.
At one point we found ourselves tasting wine at a small vineyard’s tasting center. Go figure. Revealed by only a small plaque, our table was next to a wall of Herbert Hoover’s historic home.
This aspect of Oregon brings me back to Upstate New York. Cruising rural two-lane highways and snatching up the essential provisions for a regional week-long charcuterie. And in the case of Oregon, this to be supplemented with fresh seafood at some hide-away on the coast. Rough living indeed.
One thing I noticed to be pronounced this time around was the farm stand prices were well above the supermarket prices. Similar to Hawaii. So I may be skipping the farm stands for the first time, on the next time through.
We set up camp in a complex of motel cabins well above the beach in Lincoln City. Lincoln City has always seemed to be a Cannon Beach without the fru-fru. Alas, this appears to be changing with some fancification of the beach-front hotels and new large developments done very well in a historic fashion on hilly terrain above the beaches.
These remind me very much of Park City’s old town. Some photographs of the two set side-by-side would be hard to differentiate. So my guess is the fru-fru have already arrived (sad trombone). It should be said that the new developments are well done, fit in terms of historical style, and contain small islands of the pre-existent forest in the form of parks containing short trails.
On another sad note, our favorite Oregon restaurant had closed due to the retirement of the owners. It was a small humble-elegant place which featured seafood, a signature dessert ressembling a giant ding-dong of the Hostess 1970’s variety, and Oregon wine pairings. A subtle classic of the Oregon coast.
On our first day in Lincoln City daughter no. 2 arrived by shuttle from the Portland Airport. Smiles all around.
The week in Lincoln City was all about leisure in the casual sense. Lots of long photography walks for me with the pups. Along the old and new coastal housing developments, in the small parks of original forest, up to a bluff which overlooks town, ocean and a large lake interior from the town. Others focused on a downright nasty puzzle, hanging at the beach, tidepool wanderings, spotting whales from the cabin windows and doing up an Independence day fire at sunset on the beach. This is in keeping with local tradition where larger groups hang around much larger bonfires. It all evolves into fireworks displayed from near each bonfire. We had two sparklers. When in Lincoln City.
The weather was fantastic. 72 and sunny. Normally when we visit the Oregon coast it involves a trip to the local outlet shops to pick up a sweater or raincoat. The only big purchase this time around: a pair of new flip-flops for me after a serious blowout that had left me in hiking boots for half of a day. Ugh.
Side trips involved a whale watching boat ride in Depot Bay and wandering the beach and town at Neskowin.
The whale watching was bouncing through the waves in a small inflatable boat, designed for the Navy seals. The guide was one of the first Oregon whale researchers back at the time when whale research was first becoming a thing. The coolest thing about it was two dogs, of the labradoodle variety, who were trained to spot, bark and point at the whales. Such intensity of purpose.
The biggest takeaway was the why of our only seeing partial whales. They tend to travel in quite shallow water, where they can’t perform their standard stuff, when accompanied by their youth. This allows for better protection from orcas who work together to separate mother and child so as to remove tongue from child. My fondness for orcas is now greatly diminished.
Neskowin has, since I first found it, reminded me of Many Glacier in Montana. Just a nice quiet place to enjoy the nice quiet things in life at the edge of something powerful and wild. It is a tiny village of houses that don’t scream prosperity and tend toward stormy weather but are looked after wonderfully, right on a large beach.
Oh, about the Cubs, I’m not sure I even remember the Cubs. Just another baseball team in Illinois.
Photographs are present in the Oregon 4 through 7 galleries of my Photography Galleries pages. I have a mild plan to get to a little video again going forward.