Polk County

I spent my Labor Day Sunday on my bicycle.  I started in Sherwood in Washington County, pedaled though Yamhill County and even passed through Polk County.  One of my Japanese friends, Takahiro Kazahiro, decided to bike from Milwaukie (Portland 'burb) back to Oregon State in Corvallis.  We drove and thought he was crazy.  Then we thought he was dead in a ditch when he didn't arrive and it was late.  Well after dark he finally showed up. 

It must be said that Polk County is primarily an agricultural community.  The towns are pretty small and my bike ride was almost all past farms of varying sizes and crops.  Grapes for wine is in the foothills and regular farmy-type farms on the valley floor.  Fruit stands abound and the peaches sold there are amazing!

Over the summer we made an effort to visit an old company town (mentioned in my Washington County post) that was abandoned in the 80's and was inaccessible due to fire danger.  That was the best I could think to do in Polk County.  The bike ride was a spontaneous challenge that presented itself.  My goal was riding at least 100 miles from the Portland area on the west side of the Willamette River.  By Polk County I was peaking.  I felt good and had made good progress.  Between Dallas and Monmouth there is a bike path that parallels Highway 99W that puzzles me, as the road is the same width before and after and the traffic isn't any heavier.  Yet here is this path.  And they just re-paved it. 

Monmouth has a Burgerville, which is a local burger fast food chain that sells locally grown/processed food.  Monmouth is also the only dry town I know of in Oregon.  I hit the town at lunch time and had a turkey club with an iced tea that was just what I needed.  I don't think my being geeked out in lycra was too welcome there, but no one said anything.

There you have it.  Polk County has it all: Burgerville, unexplained mysterious bike paths, and people who don't like lycra. 

Jefferson County

Fishing on Olallie Lake with Mt Jefferson in the background.

Our destination in Jefferson County was Olallie Lake which is just west of Mt. Jefferson.  The lake has good fishing and motor boats are prohibited, so it was quiet on the water.  The campgrounds are on the lake, but no drinking water is available.


There is a resort on the lake, too, which had no electricity so camping staples like ice and cold beer are not available.  They also did not sell firewood, but wood was plentiful in the woods (irony unintentional).  What was sorely lacking was insect repellent.  Mosquitoes were incredibly hungry and quite a number were around.  Our 7% DEET was laughable.  Evidently they had 10 cans with 40% DEET and one person snapped up all 10 cans.  They went into town and bought more the next day, and was again an instant sell-out.  The boat rentals were cheap and we caught a few nice rainbows while trolling in the row boat.


We avoided the mosquitoes in two ways.  One was staying in either our tents or our very large screen room.  The screen room finally earned its keep!  The other was taking the kayaks out on the lake, along with renting one of their very nice wooden row boats.  Avoid is a relative term.  Our youngest counted over 45 bites on her and the number of bites generally decreased with increased age. 


One of my standby pieces of camping equipment is an old pair of Montrail hiking shoes that are long overdue for the garbage can. I take them camping so if they get destroyed I won't be too disappointed. What makes them prime for the garbage is our now-deceased cat peed on them. They only smell after sweating in them all day; a small price to pay for comfy shoes, no? They may have made the difference in the number of times I was bitten. 


Final call: Olallie Lake is a gem.  It would be ideal later in the season (like August instead of 2nd week of July) when the bugs die down.  The campsites were full when we were there, so getting a site could be challenging when the bugs are gone.

Jackson County

The last piece to the southern Oregon puzzle was until recently Jackson County.  I finally crossed something off my list that any semi-educated Oregonian should attend: Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

Oregon Shakespeare Festival is celebrating it's 75th year, so it's newness is not an acceptable excuse.  It's mostly been the drive and laziness.  Of course, having kids make it difficult to a degree.  They are old enough now, but now eating out for five and hotel costs make it a challenge.

The in-laws took the kids, so I seized on the chance to get down there.  Planning was a lesson in Ashland's high cost of living.  Your vanilla hotel is well north of 100 bucks and expect to shell out at least another 100 for Shakespeare tickets.

We managed to find a budget motel with character that allowed pets.  Our dog got to come to Ashland, which is a challenge at times.  The weather was mild (no rain either) so the dog could hang out in the car for short stints of eating and watching the play.  Walking around, we appreciated the nooks and alleys in the city center, although the dog was not allowed in much of it.

The play!  The play was Twelfth Night, a comedy, that was great.  We saw it in the Elizabethan outdoor theatre (a replica of a 1600's London jobber).  If you were late, you were shut out until intermission, and if you were late coming back from the restroom you didn't see how it ends.  It was still funny all these years later.  I was unfamiliar with the plot until we arrived, but I imagined the wordplay could be elusive to an amateur reader.  The comedy was the timing of phrases, double-entendre, and plays on words.

Visiting Ashland for a play was a first, surely not the last.

Marion County

There is a place that sounds magical to the ears: Opal Creek.  I occasionally have read articles about Opal Creek in Sunset magazine, newspapers, or perhaps also AAA magazine.  It sounds magical.  Old growth trees along a small creek set in the Cascade range.

So it made the cut list for 36 county must-see list.  Perhaps I would have been more moved if the weather wasn't so damn hot.  And if the road wasn't closed and not having to take a windy hilly detour road.

But we went on a hot, dusty day and took a hilly detour.  One thing we joked about in the car was that the detour was fake and we were going to be robbed and left with nothing and all wearing barrels from suspenders.  Kids love that crap.

It was a nice hike despite the heat and we got to see an old mill that had an interesting, albeit short story.  The road to the mill was along a steep road, and the mill operated for about 2 years.  When the second log truck fell off the side of the mountain, they decided it was a good time to shut'er down.  They left a lot of bits behind that helps bring the site alive.  There a mineshaft along the road that provided a chilly draft that was welcome.

Opal Creek lumber mill relic

One of my continuing challenges in 36 counties is always having to keep an eye on the clock.  I have a job that I need to get back to.  Just when I am getting into exploring an area, it is time to move on to the camp, another site or back home.  On this hike, we had to turn around at the mill and head to our campsite instead of seeing more of the place.

All natural air conditioning!

Lincoln County

I went fishing in late May with my son, a friend and her husband on the Siletz River near Moonshine Park.  It was my first time (and only time so far) fishing for steelhead.  My preparation required obtaining and salmon/steelhead tag, to the tune of $25.  I got up at 3 in the morning and Evan & I headed to Moonshine Park.  Memorable moments include a large nocturnal bird, perhaps an owl, flew into the top of our windshield.  My tag doesn't allow the harvesting of owls so we hope it managed to survive the grazed windshield. 


Moonshine Park is a Lincoln County park that is quite a ways up the Siletz River (east of Siletz) and is not that easy to find.  We were meeting at 6 at the park.  I paid the day use fee only to discover we were leaving the park to an undisclosed location nearby.   We fished for a few hours in a drizzle with nary a nibble on anybody’s line.  We parted ways a little after 9.  We suspect our intelligence was flawed (somebody telling a fish story?) and the steelhead did't start running yet.


Evan & I headed to Yaquina Bay to try our luck at clamming and it was a minus tide.  We got there after the tide started coming in and I did not have a very good rake to look for cockle clams but I did have a small shovel to look for gapers.  I did manage to find a cockle clam (small) and a few butter clams (small).  So we went to the fish cleaning station with 3 small clams while others were cleaning much a more impressive collection of clams.


We took them home and ate about one small bite each of clam.