Treks and Adventures
This time Lori, Jeanette and I were off to meet up with Sylvie at the Oregon coast to search for Puffins and have a small beerfest. After picking up Sylvie in Seaside we went down to Cannon Beach for a beach walk and to see the Tufted Puffins on Haystack Rock. Seeing a puffin in the wild had been on Jeanette’s bucked list for a while and she was not disappointed on this trip. After our windy walk we went back to where Sylvie was staying for beer tasting and munchies.
The plan was to go to Mt. Rainier National Park with Lori, Jeanette and Merlyn and hike around and see the wild flowers. What was not planned for was late snow melt, record setting hot day and altitude. We ended up with a short hike at Paradise with still some flowers and lovely views but still much covered in snow. We did a short visit to Paradise Lodge and headed off for lunch. Our second hike was to be at Longmire but did some stops on the way. By the time we got to Longmire the temperature was in the 90’s so we did a visit to and lodge and headed on. Even on food stop at Papa Bears was hot and did not go a planned. If it wasn’t for the fact that it was just so darn beautiful there it would have been a bad trip but seeing the majestic beauty of Mt. Rainier and the Tatoosh Range with good friends for a while makes it all good.
This time I was off with Lori and Jeanette to a “cultural” outing to The Dallas. We have visited a number of different attractions in the Dallas before but had a few we had missed so far. This time we visited the remains of Lone Pine Tree Shaker Village , the Dallas Dam visitor center, the Fort Dallas Museum and Anderson house, and finished up at the Bargeway Pub for lunch.
We had an uncertain weather forecast so we went for a little hike and exploration in Sandy Oregon. Lori, Jeanette, Marilyn and I were going to start with a short hike of Tickle Creek Trail that runs through the expanding new neighborhoods of Sandy. On arriving and after trying several trailheads on the lower and most scenic part of the trail we found it was closed because many trees had fallen across the trail. We ended up going to the other end of the trail to hike back to the closed section. So our short hike became even shorter. Next we moved on to do a short exploration of Meinig Memorial Park. They hold several events here through out the year so now we know where it is. From the park we were able to walk up to the old section of town and start in on a walking tour of historic Sandy. The wind and rain pick up part way through our tour so we retreated back to the car and headed to lunch at the Smokey Hearth. After lunch we check out the Jonsrud Viewpoint. Not much of a view today with the bad weather but on a clear day this spot would be nice. So ended our outing.
Lori, Jeanette, Sylvia and I did a day trip down the Willamette Valley to Eugene. Our first stop was at Skinner Butte where you can get a view of the the city. From there it was just a short drive to get to 5th St. Public Market for just a quick walk through. Then it was off to do what everyone was really interested in, sampling micro brew beer. First stop was to Nankasi Brewing that we found out had closed their taproom. Fortunately Hop Valley Brewing was just a few blocks away where we were able to sample a flight of beers and get some lunch. Everyone agreed the lunch was good but the beer was not. So we were off to near by Oakshire Brewery to sample a flight of tasters that fell short of expectations. We had one more place to try at Claim 52 that was out of many of their beers so we did a short flight. Again another place not to return to. We finished our day in Eugene at a cemetery where a relative of Jeanette was buried and an appropriate place to end our visit.
