Showing posts with label Oregon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Oregon. Show all posts

Saturday, August 9, 2014

Beginning of the End of the Road

What that means
Our last day in the condo in Birch Bay was a quiet one; I went up into the town, such as it is, to have lunch with the Church Lady and the Perfesser (Buttermilk didn't want to go). We picked a place called CJ's Beach House, with a deck overlooking the bay; we chose it just because of that deck, and because, well, there aren't a whole lot of options in the little shoreline community of Birch Bay. As it happened, the place wasn't bad. The food was good with the exception of the shrimp used to top the seafood salad; they were small, cold, limp cocktail shrimp, so if I were to ever go back I'd order something else. But the service was very good and the ambience, featuring the bay across the road (with almost no traffic), was superior.

After that, we went back and fetched Buttermilk and forced her to indulge in some ice cream from the C-Store in town, then dragged her up to the little miniature golf place for a round. (I won't mention who won; I've already taken all the bows I'm going to take.)

In the evening, the Perfesser mentioned that he wanted to try something called a "poutine," which we had seen on menus in a number of places. It was described as french fries covered with sausage gravy, and he thought, repulsive as that sounded, that we ought to at least try it. After all, we wouldn't go to Delaware and not try scrapple, would we? We recalled, perhaps incorrectly, that Bob's Burgers & Brew in Ferndale had had it on their menu, so we went to the Bob's location in Birch Bay ... which didn't have it. Not only did they not offer it, the hostess wasn't entirely sure what it was. "Is that that Canadian thing with the gravy? Yeah, we don't have that." Ah, well, so we have at least one thing in Canada to look forward to besides the 2015 Women's World Cup.

What that means
(The Birch Bay location of Bob's Burgers & Brew was nothing special: I opted for a New York steak, which was a mediocre cut served slightly overcooked and, all things considered, slightly overpriced by local standards, and, it naturally follows, grossly offensive to the sense of value honed in south Texas.)

Then it was back to the condo for a last round of margaritas.

Morning comes, and off we go. On the way down to Sea-Tac, we stopped off at Burlington in response to the powerful and ineluctable call of Lafeen's Donuts. This time, it looked like hundreds of people had read and believed my previous post, as the display cases were stripped nearly bare. I could not, therefore, get an exquisitely light French cruller, nor a thick, fruity apple fritter; but had to settle, regrette rien, for a chocolate-dipped old fashioned doughnut and a blueberry fritter. (It's been almost a week and writing this makes me think of contacting them to enquire about a care package.)

Then it was down to the long-term parking where I'd stored my little convertible during the Group Tour. A quick goodbye to Church Lady and the Perfesser (because by now the rental charges on the anemic Rogue were accruing hourly), then throw our stuff in the Roller Skate, and we're off for home, the long way.

The first order of business was lunch, which we had at Las Palmas, a Salvadoran restaurant just down the street from the parking lot, where I had eaten a pretty good breakfast two Sundays before. Salvadoran food is similar in many ways to Mexican food, of course, but with a tropical twist that makes it identifiably different, certainly from the Tex-Mex variety that's so common in my home town, and from the more exotic varieties that are available in many places in south Texas. My own experience with Salvadoran restaurants back home is limited -- I can only think of two that I've been to, though I've been also to Honduran and Costa Rican restaurants, which I think are indistinguishable in any meaningful way from Salvadoran cuisine.

What that means

Our lunch wasn't quite as good as that breakfast, but it wasn't bad. I had a spinach papusa and a papusa revuelta (if memory serves): beans, beef and cheese on a thick, pillowy tortilla. Both were ordinary-good, neither was exceptional in any way. Overall the place was good enough to recommend but not good enough to recommend heartily ... except that it was cheap. And when I compare the prices I've seen around Seattle to the prices I'm used to around San Antonio, I think Las Palmas is an excellent place for lunch.

N.B.: Las Palmas appears now to be out of business (2020).

By the time we got to the freeway after lunch, we had discerned that the air-conditioning in the car wasn't working. That's not a big deal, I suppose, in Seattle, even in August, but we had six days in the desert southwest ahead of us. In fact, the drive across eastern Washington was looking like it would be hellish. But first, we decided on a stop at Snoqualmie Falls, it being a beautifully clear day, and much cooler up in the mountains.

After all the build-up to Snoqualmie Falls -- it was on the list of Things To See four years ago, and again two weekends before, and I never managed to get up there -- you would think a curmudgeon like me would have been disappointed. I wasn't. It is a beautiful waterfall, in a nice setting, with a pleasant lodge above it and not really all that many people for a magnificent summer Friday near a big city. In fact, I wish it had been another day, when I didn't have to get back in the car and head on down the road. It would've been real nice to have spent more time there.

We drove, top down, across eastern Washington. Boy, was that a mistake. Generally, my rule is this: if it's not raining, the top will be down if the temperature is more than 70 and less than 94; between 55 and 70, and between 94 and 97, it depends on other factors; but at 55 or less, and 97 or more, the top will be up. But then, I usually have air conditioning. Not this time, so I left the top down even though it got to 103, and nary a cloud in the sky. (Some smoke from the continuing wildfires, but that hardly qualifies as the silver lining in that particular cloud.)  So when we pulled into Baker City, Oregon, we were a little crispy around the edges. (After that, no matter the temperature, if the sun was up, so was the top.)

Baker City is a charming little community in eastern Oregon, once a stop on the Oregon Trail, later
Geiser Grand Hotel
(and still) a center for local agriculture. In the 1880s, it was prosperous enough to have a landmark hotel, the Geiser Grand, which was renovated about 20 years ago and returned to its former glory. I don't usually stay in such luxury, being too cheap to throw much money at a place to be unconscious; but every now and then I like to splurge, and in all honesty it wasn't really that much -- about what you'd expect to pay in a Hilton Garden Inn (which I'd never stay in, given a choice) or a Marriott. For the price we got an elegant room with a king-sized bed, a 14-foot ceiling and huge bathroom. The kind of hotel where they have embroidered bathrobes hanging there for your use. Not quite the Plaza, but beats the hell out of any Hilton Garden Inn.  Outstanding service, too, except in the bar.

twilight in Baker City
It was just coming sunset when we arrived, and it was First Friday, when this surprisingly arty little town has its monthly gallery walk. There were rumblings of distant thunder and not many people on the streets, but the several galleries in the town's Historical District around our hotel had a number of patrons in them, and enough interesting artworks visible through large windows that I would have been happy to browse among for a few hours -- but it was already pretty late and we were hot and tired and in need of a drink, so we passed on all the galleries and just strolled down to the one tall building in town, around that block to the courthouse, and back to the hotel bar. Then we retired to our room and slept the sleep of the exhausted cattle baron.

compare this to May 2013
We had no specific plans for the next day, except to get to Panguitch, Utah, so as to be within striking distance of the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. That didn't stop us, though, from taking time to see Shoshone Falls, in Twin Falls, Idaho. I had been there a year ago on the Western Circuit (an excellent trip that, I'm surprised to discover, I wrote nothing about; though I posted lots of pictures), and was as impressed as any yokel by the massive amount of water cascading over the cliff. That was in May, though; in August, it's not quite the same experience. Still nice, pretty, unexpected in such a desert, but not awesome.

There aren't a whole lot of towns in Utah south of Salt Lake, but Panguitch, a town I stayed in with a friend a couple of years ago, is a pleasant little town with almost all the motels in Southern Utah (it being 20 miles from Bryce Canyon and close also to Zion National Park, Cedar Breaks, Grand Staircase-Escalante, Capitol Reef, and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon). It also has at least one good restaurant, the Cowboy's Smoke House. (Don't get the brisket; it was dry two years ago and is still dry, but the sausage is very good and the pulled pork is outstanding. So is the service. The prices are reasonable but they only take cash. They're open, and packed, until 10.)

What that means
In the morning, we headed for the Grand Canyon. We had breakfast at the unexpected Bäkerei Forscher in Orderville, Utah. What is a high-quality German bakery doing out in the rural wilds of the Colorado Plateau? Well, obviously, they're doing a successful business, judging from (a) the big, clean, sparkling new building beside the highway and (b) the display cases that looked like everyone in Utah had been there that morning before us. From what was left, Buttermilk had a nice rhubarb streuseltaler, moist with a nice crunchy topping; while I had a vanileshiffen, which had a very good cream filling inside a slightly dry bread shell (which made it perfect for dunking). The prices were not as high as at similar snooty bakeries back home. The counter help, which may or may not have been German, was a little vague in replies to my enquiries about their offerings, so I gave up. (Besides, I didn't really want to know about the pastries, I wanted to eat them.)


(This is getting too long for most people to bother with reading, so I'll break it off here and continue it on another post.)

Monday, September 6, 2010

Oregon!

I've made it to Oregon. It's taken 49 years (maybe a little over that...) but I'm now in my 47th of the 50 states, having made it to Maine last year for the first time, and to Wisconsin and North Dakota in 2007. Before that, I don't remember the order.

Was it an auspicious start? A few miles in (and after stopping for pictures along the Smith River below Gasquet, California), we decided on a whim to take a 20-mile detour down a dead-end road to see Oregon Caves National Monument, where Sherry got her first passport stamps from the Northwest portion of the country (not counting the Redwoods N.P. stamp that I put there by mistake some years ago). (There were two stamps: one for Oregon Caves and one for the Chateau At The Oregon Caves, which is right next to the visitors' center but is, for some reason, separate.

We didn't take the cave tour; it's 90 minutes and fairly strenuous, and in my humble (sic) opinion, a cave is a cave is a cave. Having seen the glorious Carlsbad Cavern, and the almost-as-grand Natural Bridge Cavern, and some 50 or 60 others, I don't think any of the others was worth the price of admission. Now, if I were a dedicated spelunker like my friend David in Kansas City, who goes crawling through unimproved caverns on his belly with a flashlight, I might think differently, but I'm not. To me, a cave is a dark place with uneven ground, cool air, lots of bats, artificial lighting, and some cool-lookin' rocks. All things considered, I'd rather use that time to watch TV or drink a beer. 

(I think it was Mammoth Cave in Kentucky that decided me on this particular bit of philistinism. Yes, it's big, but it's also booooooooring. Just a hole in the rocks. Follow that up with Wind Cave in South Dakota and created in me is the conviction that I don't much enjoy tramping around underground.)

Anyway: the drive up to Oregon Caves was sufficiently entertaining that, on arrival, I was given a button to wear that says "I survived the drive." Those who know me will know how much I appreciate any drive that warrants such treatment. After wandering through the gift shop in the visitors' center, buying souvenir T-shirts, we went across to the Chateau, which is a large old lodge, artsy gift shop and diner in the bottom floor. Some of the locally-produced ceramics caught my interest, but I decided our car is too full already, and last time I had something of that sort shipped home (from Yellowstone) it arrived shattered, and the replacement the shop sent is ... unattractive. Decided not to chance it, though the prices were good. (I did buy a very nice belt, Nieman-Marcus quality at a Target price.)

We had an excellent (excellent!) lunch in the 1930s-style diner, then started towards Crater Lake. About 80 miles short of the park, just past the town of Gold Hill, there was a sound like locusts chirping. It got louder and louder until I pulled off the road and discovered that, whatever it was, it was coming from the car. I turned back and found a garage that, while not open for business, had a couple of mechanics inside working on what looked like a cross between a dune buggy and a dragster. One of them listened to the sound, with no clear idea of what it was, and suggested I talk to a Mr Thumler, who had a shop down the street. I found Mr Thumler -- Don -- and he said yes, bring it on down and he'd have a look at it. As I drove the car the two blocks, the noise became a grinding, dragging sound, then a thunk, and then silence.

He looked the car over for an hour and a half, maybe longer, taking off the left front wheel and examining everything from the hub ("non-serviceable -- if it's a bearing we'll have to replace the whole thing, and that'll mean getting a part from Portland") to the steering rack ("This is in good shape, nothing wrong here") to the brakes ("that black stuff on the front wheels, that's brake material") and sensor and something else that starts with an "r" and the suspension, and then examined the right front wheel ("sometimes sounds can be misleading") and all he could find wrong was that two plastic cover panels that keep dirt out of the area behind the headlamps were missing. We took a short test drive and the car sounded perfectly normal, so after another hour of politically-oriented discussion ranging from the legality of the Louisiana Purchase to the use of public lands in the American West to the Mideast dispute, the partition of India, and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars (the "Bush Wars"), we were back on the road.

Now here we are, in our hotel about 45 minutes from Crater Lake National Park at 4pm, and we've decided to take it easy the rest of today; we have a 7:15 dinner reservation in our hotel's dining room, and afterwards maybe we'll walk down to see the nearby waterfall. I've already downloaded the few pictures we've taken so far today. I haven't blogged since we got to Tahoe because we've spent all day either driving or sightseeing, and it's taking so long to download our pictures from our cameras, review them, upload them to Picasa, and cull them, that I've been too tired to write. But now I have the prospect of a relaxing evening with not too much to do; ergo, I blog.

Having just written that, we decided to walk down to Pearsony Falls, a short hike down the hill from our hotel. On the way we met a young Dutch couple who flew into Seattle a few days ago and are working their way from Olympic National Park to San Francisco; they were also going to see the waterfall, which proved to be exactly what I'd pictured Oregon as being like: substantial, though not overwhelming, quantities of water rushing over lichen-covered rocks amid lush woods. I'm thinking now we won't have to go the 30 or 40 miles out of our way that I'd planned to see a waterfall east of Florence, on the coast, in a couple of days. I've seen what I needed to see, and Sherry is perfectly content to go where ever I take her, as long as she can say "pull over here" whenever she wants.

I suppose now I should go back and recap what-all we saw and did around Tahoe and Lassen Volcanic National Park and coming up through the Redwood Forest and in Crescent City for the last few days.  Well, let's see.

Our motel in Tahoe was in a 50s-era mom-&-pop place that was a little run down but suspiciously cheap (about $45 a night, with tax). They had internet -- I checked on that before making the reservation; what they didn't have, it turned out, was air conditioning. Turned out not to matter. We opened a window and damn near froze. It was conveniently located on the lake ring-road, though on the landward side, so no view, but everything was close by. We walked down the street for dinner at a Mexican place called Chevy's that was sufficiently cosmopolitan not to be too californio for my taste. The margaritas were so-so, the food was good, and the service was very good. The only real disappointing thing was that they wouldn't serve us on their large patio area, because they "didn't have a waiter working the patio." Seemed to me that they had the same number of people to take care of, whether we sat outside or in. A very European attitudeOur motel in Tahoe was in a 50s-era mom-&-pop place that was a little run down but suspiciously cheap (about $45 a night, with tax). They had internet -- I checked on that before making the reservation; what they didn't have, it turned out, was air conditioning. Turned out not to matter. We opened a window and damn near froze. It was conveniently located on the lake ring-road, though on the landward side, so no view, but everything was close by. We walked down the street for dinner at a Mexican place called Chevy's that was sufficiently cosmopolitan not to be too californio for my taste. The margaritas were so-so, the food was good, and the service was very good. The only real disappointing thing was that they wouldn't serve us on their large patio area, because they "didn't have a waiter working the patio." Seemed to me that they had the same number of people to take care of, whether we sat outside or in. A very European attitude; it reminded me of the time I missed a connecting flight in Chicago five years ago. Lufthansa said there was nothing they could do for me. American Airlines said "Let's see what we can do," and with a few keystrokes, they had me on another flight to Turkey. Ironically, a Lufthansa flight. Anyway, since then I've encountered the same no-can-do attitude several times out here.

Next morning, first thing, we went looking for breakfast. I'd noticed a new bakery about a block from the hotel, so we went there. I had my mouth all set for some baked goods. So, what kind of bakery doesn't open until 9am? Go figure. So we walked the other way, where there was an Indian restaurant offering breakfast ... starting at 9am. We tried the coffee shop across the parking lot ... that doesn't open for breakfast until 9am. Finally settled for Heidi's, a local chain that has ordinary coffee-shop cuisine at California prices -- everything is about 50% more expensive in California, except gasoline, which is only about 15% more. The waitress suggested we visit Vikingsholm, an old mansion on the lakeshore at Emerald Bay.

After breakfast, and laundry, we went for gas (in Carson City, where it's much cheaper) and then drove all the way around the lake, stopping in several places for pictures, then came to Emerald Bay. This is the most beautiful part of a lake where "beautiful" is generally an understatement, and the part that I remembered clearly from our earlier visit here 11 years ago.

We paid the parking fee at the park and started down the path to Vikingsholm, which is part of a California state park. It's about a mile down a very steep winding driveway, and we only got about half-way down -- about a 250-foot drop -- before I decided that I might not be able to get back up. It was very tiring, though I think now it was more the altitude than the strenuousness of the climb. (I think that because, in Lassen a couple of days later, I made a similar hike at a slightly lower altitude with no great problem.) 

I also think, now, that a part of the reason was that I find that I feel extremely unwelcome in California. Everywhere in California. I felt it last year in San Diego; I felt it in Tahoe; I felt it in Lassen and in the Redwood Forest and in Crescent City. I feel inclined not to ever go back there, despite its unrivaled scenery and cultural attractions.

Anyway: so we didn't make it down to Vikingsholm. We went back to the room, rested some, and then drove up to Zephyr Cove, on the Nevada side, and took a cocktail cruise on the lake, on a catamaran. Sherry hadn't wanted to do that because, in her mind, catamarans were unpleasantly wet rides, but when I showed her a picture of the boat -- 55 feet long, with room for 30-something people -- she reluctantly agreed to go. I wanted to take the catamaran because, (a) it was at the right time of day; (b) it was out of a nearby harbour; and (c) it was a little cheaper than any of the other cruises on offer. Turned out to be a very nice ride. The boat was comfortable, the other passengers were pleasant -- we spoke mainly with a couple who live in San Luis Obispo, though she's from Alabama and he's from New York -- and the drinks were almost the only bargains I've come across so far on this trip.

(I do hate to go on and on about the cost of everything, but I have just been so flabbergasted by the cost of things out here. I know San Antonio's cheaper than a lot of places -- actually, just about everyplace -- but in the last year or so it seems like the differences have been magnified astoundingly, and even more so in California.)

Next morning we were up bright and early and on the road to Lassen Volcanic National Park, skirting along the edge of the desert, then up into the mountains. The road, conveniently, goes through the park from south to north, so we got to pass right by all the interesting sites. We got out and hiked up to Bumpass Hell, a Yellowstone-like geothermal outcropping that smells of sulpher and sounds like trucks on a highway. We also hiked around Reflection Lake, just to get a nice picture of the mountains reflected in the water.

We came down out of the mountains into Redding, where it was 103 degrees. Surprise! Only wanted to see the Sundial Bridge, then drove on up the road to Weed. We spent that night at the foot of Mount Shasta, which is a nice-looking mountain but really has no other attractions for people who don't want to hike, or mountain-bike, or go snowmobiling or fishing.

In the morning we drove through the mountains to the coast. When I was planning out the route I found I'd chosen a road that was unpaved, so I changed it ... to a road that's under construction as it skirts along cliffs in the middle of wilderness. It took forever, but was a pretty drive along the North Fork Salmon River. The road, in many places, was only one lane. I'm just grateful that the cement truck we passed came along in one of the wider sections.

Up the coast, we turned off to the parkway through the Redwoods, and went for a hike at the Big Tree turnout. This was a hike I'd taken with my son a few years ago, up past the Big Tree to the Cathedral Trees. I thought it was just a loop trail, but apparently it's not; it goes on and on and comes out about a mile and a half south of where we'd parked. Then we walked up a short trail to the Corkscrew Tree, then drove up the coast to our hotel in Crescent City. After checking in, we went over to watch the sun set on one of the lighthouses just off the shore there.

And then we got up in the morning and came to Oregon. And I'm all caught up, though I know I've left out a whole lot of interesting things that I had meant to write about.