PORTLAND, OREGON GARDENS

Jenkins Estate

On every trip to the northwest, we always plan on stopping in Portland so that we can visit Powell's bookstore to exchange our used books for more used books.  This time we carried in 4 heavy bags of books and carried out about the same amount we carried in.  While we were in the downtown Powell's, there was a fun run in the streets outside.  Getting out of town was a nightmare of one-way streets, blocked off streets, crazy runners in goofy getups milling around, and the general hubbub of a Saturday night on the town.  

Rhododendron Flowers

It was a lot easier when we went to the Powell's in Beaverton where we found many more books to cart back to the groaning rv.   While we were in the Beaverton area, we also indulged our second favorite thing to do in Portland, which is visit gardens.  The Jenkins Estate is not far from Beaverton and

95 year old elm trees

was actually considered to be in the countryside when purchased by Belle and her husband.  Belle was the daughter of a shipping magnate in Portland and loved horses, so the new home included stables and riding paths along with English garden areas, rhododendron gardens, a pond garden, meadows, and an Elm drive (which is 95 years old now).  

Kerr Home, Garden of the Bishop's Close

The following couple of days were pouring rain, off and on, which sort of put a damper on any further exploration of gardens, but luckily we had any number of books to choose from and read.  But on the third day of rain, we decided to do as the Portlanders do, which is go out there anyway.  So we grabbed a couple of umbrellas and went to visit Elk Rock, the Garden of the Bishop's Close.  

Garden of the Bishop's Close

This was originally the home (and business) of a Scottish immigrant who specialized in importing grain back in 1888.  The home sits on a bluff, which is itself on a steep hillside, overlooking the Willamette River.  

Level area up on the hillside

Although Kerr was an avid gardener, he hired the Olmsted Brothers of Massachusetts to design the garden and this is one of only two Olmsted gardens which are open to the public.  The design incorporated small staircases up and down the steep hillside so that access to any portion of the hillside was easy and because of the benches here and there, you could sit and look at the river or at East Portland across the river (if the rain hadn't drenched the benches, of course).  

Looking across the Willamette River to East Portland

The gardens are a combination of the plants Kerr collected on his world travels and one of the finest collections of Northwest native trees and plants.  It is all combined in a cultivated English style garden which Kerr worked on for 60 years before passing away at the age of 95.

Viewing Kerr's home from the front lawn and garden.

 His daughters donated the house and gardens to the Episcopal Diocese of Portland with the stipulation that the gardens themselves be always open to the public.  This was a favorite garden, of all we visited during this stay.  Every little nook, bend, and flower bed was filled with delight.  I am sure that in the sunshine, it would be even more stunning.  

Carrot Cake Extraordinaire 

But after this excursion, we needed to have some lunch and get dry.  And you can't eat lunch without having dessert, can you?  A really decadent carrot cake with coconut and chocolate included was hard to split between us, especially when Allan took more than his share.
On our last day in the area, we returned to two gardens which are on our list of favorites.  

Leach Botanical Garden

The first is the Leach Botanical Garden which is a collection of plants by John and Lilla Leach who traveled all over the northwest collecting plants for their botanical garden.  Lilla was a botanist and I have a soft spot in my heart for her as I was a botanist once myself and I know how difficult it can be traveling into backcountry to gather (or identify, in my case) specimens.  Although I used an old dodge truck provided by the forest service, Lilla and John used mules.   This is a small garden, placed above and below the home, which is along a creek.  

Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden

We were able to easily walk the paths within an hour, take lots of photos, and be on our way to the Crystal Springs Rhododendron Gardens across the street from Reed College.   The really great thing about this garden is all the walking paths along the ponds which have many different kinds of ducks, geese, and other water birds.  

Wood Duck

The water comes from a spring that produces 6000 gallons a minute and there are many water features including little waterfalls and creeks.  This is the only garden we have visited on this trip where we had to pay admission, but for $4 each, it was well worth it.  I got about 5000 steps on my fitbit walking this garden.  

HEADING NORTH UP THE OREGON COAST

Tolowa Dunes State Park

On our penultimate day in Brookings, we decided to drive south to Tolowa Dunes State Park which is just north of Crescent City.   This is a beach that has areas of small pebbles with people laying flat on their stomachs scratching around in the stones for agates.  It is the strangest sight, almost like a bunch of beached whales except they are gemstone hunters.  We had hoped that we would get some sun for our beach day, but no such luck as you can see in the photo, I am layered up to protect myself from the biting cold wind and damp fog.  

Unger Bay Fish n' Chips

Wednesday was our day of travel.  We drove up to Winchester Bay RV Park which is on a bay where oyster harvesting takes place.  The park is beautiful and is owned by the Salmon Harbor Marina.  Nice wide spaces with grass and trees, modern hookups, and views of either the inner harbor or the outer bay from every site.  The down side is that the wind rushes up the bay almost 24/7 and the fog is pervasive although we did have about an hours worth of sun when we arrived.  The first thing we did after getting settled was head over to the harbor for fish and chips.  The restaurant is actually a floating barge and has some of the best halibut and chips ever.  

In the evening we took a drive around the end of the peninsula to see the dunes.  This is ATV heaven, with trails running every which way over and around the sand dunes.  They had their own campgrounds, thank goodness.    

Dean Creek Elk Reserve

Winchester Bay is located about 5 miles south of Reedsport where we went the following day.   We had breakfast at the Harbor Lights Cafe and then drove east about 5 miles to the Dean Creek Elk Reserve.  Every time we are in this area, we drive to the reserve in hopes of seeing the elk, with no luck at all.  But finally we saw some elk and they were everywhere.  Plus they did not seem at all perturbed with all the people taking photos.  

This reserve was created in the 1990's by the combined efforts of Duck's Unlimited, Fish and Game, and (I think) the Dept of Interior.  In addition to the Roosevelt Elk, the reserve is for migrating birds to have a place to stop, eat, and rest on their flights north or south.  There were four large ponds created and various kinds of bird sanctuary houses were built for the different kinds of birds.   The reserve runs about 5 miles along the Umpqua River.  It was a lucky day in more ways than one because in addition to seeing the elk, the sun also came out.  

A WEEK IN BROOKINGS, OREGON

Brookings Harbor

Even though the weather forecast says sunshine each day, we always start off with overcast clouds or fog.  Although yesterday the sun was out for several hours, today it did not burn through until about 3 p.m.    You might probably ask why we bother coming to a town that is in economic decline, has fog and drizzle almost every day, and is difficult to access without traveling through forest and canyon.  

Gold Beach Bookstore

Well I guess because it is really beautiful when the sun does shine, and it is not 100 degrees like in Arizona right now, and there are little businesses lurking between the buildings with the for lease signs.   Like the Gold Beach Bookstore which has new and used books, shows art works by local artists, and where we can buy a mocha or espresso to drink while we are searching out some good reading buys.  Upstairs they have first editions in the rare book room and were featuring a book collection that had been purchased from Glenn Ford.  There are also letters and manuscripts.

Bakery By The Sea

We also found a teeny, tiny bakery which is only open 3 days a week, without even a storefront, just a door into a narrow hallway to a kitchen the size of our fifth wheel.  But they are turning out some great sourdough bread, scones, bran muffins, and the most light and delicious ciabatta rolls ever.   Yes, all six of those rolls are for us.    

This last weekend was the Azalea Festival here in Brookings, so we went down to the harbor to take a look at the festivities.   In addition to the usual vendors, there was one young man giving camel rides on his 3 camels.   He assured me that they never spit unless they felt they were being attacked, so I gave the camel a pet on the nose.  They have the softest fur and the longest eyelashes.  Plus, their lips are hairy, they only have lower teeth except for a couple of upper molars in the far back of their mouth, and they are one of the two toed animals.  Really interesting animals.   

But mostly we are in Brookings so that Allan can walk the dogs at the beach.  Early in the morning, the beach is empty and he can let them explore and play on the sand.  They also walk back along the jetty where Allan has seen breaching whales and sea lions.  Then he completes the circuit by walking past the Coast Guard Station and past the boat slips to our park which is just across the street.  

While he is off exploring, I have been trying to finish a needlepoint canvas that I purchased on Bainbridge Island about 6 years ago and have been stitching on periodically whenever we travel.  I have been determined to get it done on this trip and finally it is finished (although it still will need to be blocked, stretched, and made into a pillow.  It was supposed to be a chair cushion, but the chair is long gone, so it will just be a pillow.   

NORTH TO BROOKINGS, OREGON

Highlands RV Park, Bishop, CA with the Sierras in the background.

This last week was spent traveling from Bishop to Brookings.   The morning we left Bishop was clear and sunny, but still cold enough to keep the snow on the nearby Sierras intact.  As we drove north up 395, the snow was all along the roadside all the way up to Bridgeport where we stopped for breakfast at the Bridgeport Inn.  At the end of our meal, the waitress brought me a chocolate covered strawberry for Mothers Day.  

Hwy 395, around June Lakes, CA

We continued up 395 past Reno to Standish, CA where we stay at the Days End RV Park which is about the only business in Standish besides a gas station.  But it is charming with flower beds, a dog park, and great views all around.  The next morning we headed west past Lassen National Park to Hwy 5 and then north to Medford, Oregon where we spent two nights at the Holiday RV Park.  Our free day in Medford was spent stocking up at TJ's and visiting used bookstores in Ashland, Oregon.  The weather was rainy and cold while we were there.  Finally on our last lap, we headed up Hwy 5 to Grants Pass and then turned west to travel along the Smith River to Crescent City and then north on the coast hwy to Brookings, CA.  

Brookings Harbor

We always stay at the Driftwood RV Park and right now during May it has many spaces available.  Here on the coast it is cloudy with the sun peeking through periodically.  But that has not deterred Allan from walking the beach with the dogs about 3 times a day.  Since there are not many people on the beach right now, the dogs can run free and explore all they want.   No big plans for us while we are here although we heard that the Azalea Festival is next weekend, so we might check that out.  

It's A Dog's Life

Murray flying after Elsie with all four feet off the ground.

Our trip down the Oregon Coast began in Cannon Beach, a beach mecca for Portland residents who cram the small town to its seams on the weekends and taper off during the week.  The beaches were clean and white and long.  Aside from photo taking jaunts up in Astoria at the marina, there were long walks on the beach with the dogs and not much else unless you wanted to break the bank shopping or eating in Cannon Beach.  We stayed at Sea Ranch where there was every kind of camper imaginable and bonfires each night reaching 12 feet high at every tent site.   One thing about weekend campers, they don't stint on the firewood.   We took the dogs with us when ever we were going to the beach and they took to it right away.  Elsie becomes superdog and can outrun Murray without even trying.  She will get way out ahead of him and then circle around and come running straight at him, making a jump over him to head off in a new direction.  He tries and tries to keep up and finally lays down in the sand with his tongue hanging out.

After leaving Cannon Beach, we headed down to Lincoln City.  This was another city where we had never stayed before.  We were determined to get out of our rut of always staying in Florence or Charleston and trying some new places on the coast.  Although the Premier RV park in Lincoln City was very nice and we found a great little town down the coast called Garibaldi which was a tiny fisherman's harbor where Allan was able to get some great photos of boats and marine buildings, I doubt that we would ever go back.    There just isn't any comparison with staying at the harbor in Florence or staying at the marina in Charleston where we can get halibut and chips for a reasonable price at the little fish n'chips stand.

Siletz Beach

Yesterday we arrived in Waldport where we will stay until Sunday.  Then we are headed down to Brookings for our last month at the coast for this year.   When we arrived the sun was out and the people in McKinleys' Marina RV Park were all outside their rigs in disbelief.  One woman told us they had had 74 days straight of rainy weather.  We took the opportunity to drive down to Yachats where the coast is rocky and get some photos.  Good thing we did because by dinner time the clouds were rolling in and it was raining with thunder and lightning by 8 o'clock.   I didn't want to tell her that everywhere we go it rains, they might have asked us to leave.  

Home Again, Home Again

During our last weekend in Brookings, our daughter and son-in-law joined us for a few days and it was so good to see them again. While Stacey and I went to the farmers market, Allan and Pat kayaked down the Chetco River. We drove them up river about 5 miles and dropped them off and later when we got the call, we headed over to the harbor to pick them up. Unfortunately it was a gray, foggy day, with not a ray of sunshine to be seen....but that did not deter them in the least. Because it was near the end of summer, the river was low in several places and so they had to portage through the shallow spots. The photo above shows Allan pulling his kayak into the deeper water. The photo at left is Pat in one of the deeper areas of the river. Notice that they are both wearing their jackets...it just was not that warm. Meanwhile Stacey and I found numerous things to purchase while at the farmers market and it was also Pet weekend, so everyone had their dogs along. It was really festive and we had a good time too. Later that night we all went out to dinner. We were sorry to see them go the following day. We headed out for home not too long after, first stopping in Ashland for a couple of nights, then up and over the Pass, cutting east at Mt Shasta to Standish where we stayed overnight, and then on to Mono Lake for two nights before heading east and south to Las Vegas for a night and we arrived home last Friday.

It was 111 degrees in Apache Junction and we spent the evening and the following morning unloading the rv which I am glad that we did right away, as the air conditioner in our house started burning up and spitting sparks and generally biting the dust early on Sunday morning. One of our neighbors gave us a number to call for service and someone came out right away on Labor Day and when he saw how overheated I was, he went back to the office and brought out a portable a/c to put in our bedroom, so we would have one room where we could be cool. So now....it is Wednesday and we have a brand new system and a huge dent in our savings account. But everything is working, we are finally cool, and we met some neighbors who came out to watch the crane and talk with us whom we had never met before. Today we finally got the rv into storage for the winter but in October we will be getting it back out for a few days while we get a new water heater installed and new Arizona registration taken care of.

Last Coastal Stop in Brookings

After spending two nights in Bandon where we got a little sun each afternoon, we headed down the coast to Brookings to stay at the Driftwood RV Park. After we got settled in, Allan took the dogs over to the beach where they examined every piece of seaweed and exoskeleton to determine if it was edible. They seemed to think that the beach was their personal snack bar. Notice that Allan is wearing his levis and a sweatshirt, that is because the temperature is in the 50's. Every morning here in Brookings is socked in with wet fog and the sun does not try to make an appearance until almost dinner time.

One of the first items on our Brookings agenda was to head down to Crescent City and get prescriptions refilled at Walgreens. While we were there we stopped at the visitor center to inquire about good access to the beach and were given directions to Kellogg Beach a little north of town. It was a beautiful beach with a line of stones along the wave bench and there were several people walking along looking for agates. One man had a garden rake which he used to uncover stones under the sand and he showed us several agates which he had found. We did not find any agates but did take home a small bag of stones for our garden and we also got numerous photos of the beach, the beach grass, and the sand dunes.

Yesterday was a trip to the past. We headed up the Smith River, a wild and scenic river flowing from Oregon down into California and out into the Pacific. When we lived in Southern Oregon many years ago, we used to bring our kids and dogs to the Smith to raft. We also used to drive all the way to Crescent City to gather old seaweed from the beach to dig into our garden for compost. It must have worked, we had more veggies than we could can on our woodstove. This was a perfect day for memories as the sunshine was warm and the forest smelled sweet as we stopped for lunch at the Patrick's Creek Lodge, an old historic stopping place for travelers long ago. We used to drive down from Oregon to have dinner there 30 years ago and we were pleased to see that it looked just the same. We had lunch in the dining room but looked into the bar where we had always had a drink before eating, back in the old days. After lunch we walked down under the highway bridge along the river to the NFS campground. We got excited for a few moments when we saw they were looking for summer campground hosts but then we realized that although we could deal with the no electricity hurdle we would not be able to get through the summer without cell phone or broadband coverage for our internet. Oh well, it was nice to fantasize about being back in Patrick's Creek again and we were pleased that we had a whole day in the sunshine.

Fish n'Chips in Charleston

Finally we are back over on the Oregon Coast having a true summer coastal experience of moist, misty, cold, dense fog throughout the night and day accompanied by the mournful dirge of the foghorn. The good news is that we are only about 500 yards from our favorite fish n'chips place where we placed an order for halibut and chips not 15 minutes after we back up, pull forward, push back, tweak forward, twist backward, creep forward, curl backward, straighten forward, and inch back into our space at the Charleston Marina.


Since we would have had to move 5 days into the stay, we decided to move down to Bandon for 2 nights after we leave here, before ending our summer vacation in Brookings. After leaving Portland, we stayed 2 nights in Eugene at the Deerwood RV Park, where we stayed last year with Rose and Mike. While we were there, we managed to visit the farmers market where we loaded up on produce and baked goods. Then we drove over to Smith's Family Bookstore where we found more literary treasures to add to the growing pile in the rv. Smith's has so many books that they have given up putting them on shelves and all of the recent arrivals are just stacked in the aisles in front of the bookshelves where they should be if there weren't already numerous books on those shelves already. It is hard to envision how the new electronic books could replace the visual and tactile pleasure of searching through old books, finding a hidden volume on some subject that you previously hadn't given much thought about, and now finding that someone in the past had written something that stimulates your interest here in the present. For both of us, a used bookstore is more than just reading the books, it is all about the discovery of a book of which we were previously unaware. Here in Coos Bay we also found a used book store where Allan found several personal war accounts, of which he is so fond.


Yesterday however, we went down the coast to visit the sea lions and get some more ocean photos. We were lucky, the sun came out sporadically for about an hour. Today we went to the Coos Bay farmers market and found a man selling iris rhizomes. What luck. We had been looking for iris plants in nurseries and had not found very many to choose from. And how often do you see an iris rhizome seller at a farmers market? Well never, until today. It must be our lucky day, so we celebrated by going to our favorite fish n'chips place for lunch.

The City of Portland

We have been here in Portland for one week now and we have not had a dull moment. Last Friday after we set up and rested for a bit, we headed over to Tualatin Commons for the free concert on the commons that happens every Friday night during the summer. This Friday, in addition to a Jazz and Blues Band there was also the ArtFest with tents set up for the art displays. We got our chairs arranged on the lawn and then wandered through the various art works and noticed that there were no pastel artists, mostly watercolor and acrylic. There were also many photographers and jewelers. Further down the commons we found the farmers market and proceded to purchase giant sweet boysenberries, fragrantly sweet marionberries, fresh strawberries, and plump little blueberries. We polished off almost all of the boysenberries and marionberries before we even got back to the rv. On Saturday morning we drove to Portland for the mother of all farmers markets held in the parkway near the University. We spent almost two hours wandering around the many booths filled with produce, fresh flowers, fruit, pickles, breads, coffees, chocolates, meat, fish, eggs, spices, soaps, granolas, pesto, mushrooms, and many other local products which I am probably forgetting right now. We loaded up on croissants, pickled beets, pickled carrots, fresh basil, tomatoes, green beans, crookneck squash, fresh cream cheese, and eggs. We could have easily brought home a lot more, but we have an automatic brake called the rv refridgerator, which only holds what it can, and no more. While we were walking around the market we were entertained by bands positioned at either end of the market boundaries.

On Sunday during our "at home" day, we discovered that our oven pilot light would not light and so on Monday we made a service call to an rv repair guy who came out and determined the problem was the thermocouple line which ran up from the pilot light to the top of the stove where it was connected to the regulator knob. He came out the following day to install a new one and it was too short. While he was locating a line that was the right size, we entertained ourselves by going to the factory outlets in Woodburn. Thanks to the economy, everything was on sale, marked down from the object's original outrageous price to some lower price, which was then decreased further by 50% off of the lowest knocked down price. So Allan found some new sandal slides and a couple of shirts, while I was able to find some cargo pants. On Thursday, we were finally able to get the oven repaired and immediately afterward we headed off to Beaverton to check out used book stores. One of the bookstores that we visited was only for online trading although they took a look through the books we were trying to trade and picked out a couple they would take. Then we went to the Cedar Hills Powells bookstore where we offloaded some more of our recently read books and promptly filled up our bags with more books that we found in the store. So we should be set for a few weeks at least in terms of reading. In the same shopping center as Powell's, we found a little Italian restaurant called Pastinos and they had the best $6.00 lunches of a choice of pasta, salad, and ciabatta bread. We were in heaven. Today we went to the Lan Su Chinese Garden in Portland where we took lots of photos and then had tea in the teahouse while we were entertained by a Chinese man playing a traditional stringed instrument. Very Zen.

Casey's Riverside RV Park in Westfir, Oregon

Usually we stay in Tualatin when we want to be near Portland, but this time we decided to stay at the Pheasant Ridge RV Resort in Wilsonville which is just a few exits further south. http://www.pheasantridge.com/ This is a lovely landscaped park on a terraced hillside. They have clean as a whistle restrooms and showers with plenty of hot water and an indoor swimming pool with spa. The prices seemed on a par with other parks with the Good Sam discount and we stayed two nights so that we could do some stocking up at Trader Joes just up the freeway a few exits. The only negative note came when we tried to make the turn out of our site when exiting. Notice the white pole stuck in the ground at the end of the site? I am sure it is there so people do not drive over their grass but it barely gave us enough room to make the turn and we had to back up and try again at a different angle. Plenty of help and advice from all the neighbors and we were on our way.

We headed south through Eugene, turning east at Goshen on Hwy 58 for 30 more miles to Westfir. After we saw the park where we had reservations, we almost did not turn in. There were several very old mobile home perms near the entrance and it did not look too inviting, but we decided it was only for two days so we turned into the driveway and drove on past the mobile homes to the office where we could see that Casey's Riverside RV Park http://www.caseysrvpark.com/ was actually past the office and along the river. And it was beautiful. Many tall trees and flowers everywhere, green lawns all manicured. There was a community barbeque area with a free soft serve ice cream machine. And of course the middle fork of the north fork of the Willamette River rushing along carrying its many fish, according to our new neighbor. Many of our rv neighbors have been staying here for the summer for a number of years. It has great weather and is within driving distance to Eugene for more serious shopping. We are giving it some consideration for one of our stays next summer. We will definitely stay longer next time. Today was rainy all day so Allan made Chili and I worked on my needlepoint in the morning. During the afternoon we just laid around and read our books and napped and then after dinner we got out for a walk with the dogs and met some new neighbors, Bill and Jana, who had traveled to many of the same places that we have been. It is always fun trading traveling stories and locations. And tomorrow we continue east and south to Tule Lake, the land of ducks and horseradish.