Early season


Originally uploaded by MisterBlue



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It is Halloween as Costco,It is Halloween as Costco,

Since everyone else is going green, I decided I’d take mass transit for a day trip downtown and to the zoo. It is a short drive to the local transit station (there are no weekend buses in my immediate neighborhood) so I bussed from here to downtown. The Portland streetcar took me cross town where I had a pleasant morning coffee with some friends — sitting in their old house with the windows open and the large trees overhanging the house and street. There are some great neighborhoods in the city.

The train to the deepest subway station in North America and up to the zoo. I haven’t been in a few years and the place is expanding. There is a lot of construction. The monkey house is being remodeled for the great apes and the artic tundra exhibit has been torn out to be replaced with a large cat area. The zoo is not dying.

The elephant barn was closed to visitors. I finally noticed the TV trucks parked outside and, when I went into the display area, I found a crowd of people watching closed circuit TVs. Just a few hours earlier, the mother elephant’s water had broken and there was great excitement over the imminent birth of an elephant. It could happen at any time. I waited around for about 30 minutes but eventually left. The baby was born about two hours later.

Mass transit worked wonderfully for me and the weather was lovely. A relaxing day.

Another beautiful day in Oregon and certainly not a day to stay inside. I got in the car and drove to the beach. Didn’t want to just visit the cities and the casinos and outlet malls but decided to see the relatively untraveled coast between Tillamook and Lincoln City. Pictures are available.

Driving out highway 26 I saw that Banks was holding their annual Elephant Garlic Festival. I made a quick stop, enjoyed some music and purchased an elephant ear from a vendor. The vendors seemed to be mostly local people. While I was waiting for my ear to fry, another vendor came over and they swapped garlic recipes.

At the coast, I stopped at the Tillamook Creamery and purchased some squeaky curds. Those are the un-aged cheese curds and they do squeak when you bite into them. You don’t find them in the stores because they don’t keep well. A delicacy of a trip to the beach.

The beach time visited the town of Netarts, Cape Lookout and down to Neskowin. All nice towns and wonderful scenery.

On the way back inland, I ran across the Driftcreek covered bridge. It has quite a story. The bridge, in its original location, was condemned by the county and was scheduled to be torn down because of rot and a good bridge was needed. A local family took all of the bridge pieces and, with the help of many local volunteers and a local lumber mill, they rebuilt the bridge on their land. An act of love.

I also stopped at the Evergreen Air and Space Museum. Evergreen Helicopter is based there in McMinnville and the family has built a gigantic museum sitting among the fields of grape vines. Besides many interesting planes, the museum now sports Howard Hughes Spruce Goose. I don’t have a good picture of that plane — it’s just too big. If you are a fan of airplanes, though, this is the place to go.