"Tell Everyone on This Train I Love Them"

Nearly 18 months has passed since the terrible day that three local men were stabbed on Portland's MAX train. Compassionate, thoughtful people have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the victim's families, and a permanent memorial was put in place one year after the crime. Even now it is difficult to talk about.

On the train, a likely mentally ill man spouted just awful hateful anti-Islamic, anti-immigrant words at two teenage girls of color, one veiled. Three men stepped forward to diffuse the situation and stand up for the girls. The perp cut the throats of all three before the eyes of all on the train. One man died immediately, another later in the hospital, and the third survived.

The last words of the second man were "tell everyone on this train I love them." His words are inscribed on the memorial.

Are You Too Old to Trick or Treat??

Halloween is past, but just so you know for next year, here's how to tell if you're too old to trick-or-treat:


10--You get winded from knocking on the door

9--You have to have a kid chew the candy for you

8--You ask for high fiber candy only

7--When someone drops a candy bar into your bag, you lose your balance and fall over

6--People say, "Great Keith Richards mask!" and you're not wearing a mask

5--When the door opens you yell, "Trick or ---" and can't remember the rest

4--By the end of the night you have a bag full of restraining orders

3--You have to carefully select a costume that won't dislodge your hairpiece

2--You're the only Power Ranger in the neighborhood using a walker

1--You avoid going to houses where your ex-wives or husbands live

Tillamook Cheese Factory 2018--Bigger and Better Than Ever!

The Tillamook Cheese Factory is one of our favorite places to visit on a trip to the Oregon Coast. It happens to be the second most visited tourist site in the state, behind the natural splendor of Multnomah Falls. The cheese is great, the ice cream superb, and watching the cheesemakers work (while consuming a cone of delicious Espresso Madness) is mesmerizing.

The cheese fac as we knew it pre-2018 featured a small short-order grill and cafe, small crowded ice cream bar, small gift shop, crowded cheese-tasting line, and an upstairs view of the cheesemakers at work. A visitor could watch the cheese making and packaging process from behind enormous second-floor plate glass windows, if you could peer past the teeming masses.

As a bonus, a drive through the Tillamook area features vast green fields and brick-red barns, all of them full of various breeds of dairy cows: jersey, guernsey, holstein, brown swiss, and Dutch belt. Those very cows yesterday provided the milk for the cheese you will eat today.

In spring 2017 the Tillamook Creamery Association announced it would be closing the cheese fac for a year to rebuild the fantastically popular and horribly overcrowded visitor facilities. Here are four photos  of the old fac:

Well, it's out with the old, in with the new! We stopped at the brand new facility with out-of-town grandchildren in August 2018, along with what felt like the entire population of Oregon! It may be many times larger, but so are the crowds.

the new entrance is grand!

H experienced the brand new children's room

the world's best ice cream is always our favorite part of the day

everyone wants a "ride" in the Tillamook bus

We're pleased with the new, even though a summer-day visit is still madness. I took my Boston cousin ME here in October on a lovely un-crowded fall day. I enjoyed the new educational posters about milk and cheesemaking in the cheese sample area. The displays showing breeds of cows and what they eat have enlightened me as to how complicated a milk cow's life can be. Or I should say, the life of a dairyman. The shop is full of cheese-related items, both the practical and the kitsch. The new fac is a super upgrade from the old!

The Halloween House

A few blocks from us lives a family who is so in love with Halloween that they go to extreme effort to dress up their house every year. They're creative and gutsy, and it is always fun to walk by the place this time of year.

These photos don't do it justice. The magic of darkness transforms it into a place I would refuse to venture if I was under the age of 10. On Halloween night they add other 'features' such as smoke, a creepy farting clown, and eerie music. There are demons, witches and ghouls hanging from unseen guy wires in every direction. Crowds come from all around to gawk at the show. Tonight the sheriff parked a car across the street from the house and invited children to 'trunk or treat.' One year a local news channel reported on Halloween from this house.

Closer to us is another Halloween house that is just as good but in a different way. Every year they become more creative with their displays. They have a long driveway which you traverse at your own peril. They also give out full-size candy bars! I did not get around to taking photos of this one. All of the below are from the first house.

Happy Halloween!

Beacon Rock

On the Washington side of the Columbia Gorge is a volcanic plug called Beacon Rock. About a hundred years ago someone built a trail up to the top, and it's a marvel. It isn't long, maybe a mile, and it's not a huge upward slog, perhaps 800 feet elevation gain. Looking at these two photos, it appears trail-less. Where would they even put a trail on that hunk of basalt?

Well, once you get through the the early part of the trail through the forest, here is the doozy part that lies ahead:

51 switchbacks and no earth beneath! It's a little eerie to climb up an external [is that the right word?] trail like this. I can't think of another one like it. I hold on to the pipe and refrain from looking down as much as possible. On the descent it looks like this:

In 1805 Lewis and Clark stopped here on their journey down the Columbia River. This was the first point where they detected tides, a sure sign the Pacific Ocean was not far ahead.

We have climbed the rock plenty of times. The summit is high enough that the views up and down the river are uninterrupted. The wind whips you around at the top--it is never not windy up there. On the way is this pretty stone wall that keeps climbers from plunging to their deaths:

 

Someone thought it wise to put an actual door on the trail to keep people away during the dangerous hours of darkness.  I assume the park service really does lock and unlock this door every day.

 

Views from the top:

UPDATE 16 January 2018: here is a news report noting a large boulder fallen on the Beacon Rock Trail

Mt. St. Helens--Again

 St. Helens from the north; we climb from the south and stand on the rim at the center top; the bulge in the crater center is the lava dome

After summiting Mt. St. Helens some years ago my friend and I decided we should do it about every five years or so, just to see if we still could. It's a brutally hard climb for me. Others who have strong constitutions and fabulous lung capacity breeze up the slopes easy as I climb a flight of stairs. But that is not my gift, and really isn't even within the realm of my capability. I do it anyway, in my own snail-ish plodding way, because: active volcano plus geology freak = must experience.

I climbed successfully for the first time about 1997, then 2006 and 2011. Back in 1994 I got maybe halfway when climbing with a group of high school students. The wind was terrible that day and when snow began to fall we aborted the attempt.

In 2016 it was time to try again, but my knee was giving me trouble so we put it off. This year I was not excited about making another effort, and didn't think it was possible for me to summit. But what the heck, why not give it a go.

My friend and I camped overnight at Climbers Bivouac, same as we have done previously. We hit the trail at 5:30 a.m. and watched the forest gradually grow light as the sun rose. The weather was biting--probably in the 30s, and crazy windy. Never fear, I wore a thin wool long-sleeve base layer over my shirt, base layer leggings under hiking pants, a thin wind-proof shell, wool socks, hiking boots, gloves and head cover.

 let's hit the trail!

sun's up!

After about 2.5 miles on the upward forest trail we began the climb through the rocks.  Out in the open the wind shoved us around. My sunglasses kept the blowing ash and cinders out of my eyes. The huge rocks take a ton of energy to navigate. My short legs keep me from leaping gracefully from rock to rock like a mountain goat. I'm more of a lumbering groundhog straining to heave my bulk up to the next level.

Out of the rocks and about a thousand feet from the summit, I bonked. My blood sugar hit the basement which startled me, because I had been eating the right foods at regular intervals all the way up. My progress was halted within sight of the goal. Elated climbers were lined up on the rim above. So close and yet so far.

After a rest I resumed the climb with a sensible tried-and-true strategy. If I put one foot in front of the other and counted out 100 steps between rests, and didn't think about how far it still was to the summit, then it could be done. And the strategy was successful! It seemed like an eternity, but there I was on the rim gazing down into the smoking crater. Forest-fire haze closed the curtain on the usual views of Mounts Adams, Hood and Rainier. But still, what a glorious place to be.

 summit!

On the descent we slid quickly down the ash slope, then came face to face with the rocks. It's even less fun going down through them than coming up. This time we skirted below them on the west side until the forest trail picked up to the east. The climb up took 6.5 hours, an hour longer than my longest previous climb, and 1.5 hours longer than my personal best. The descent? Probably 4-5 hours.

As usual we celebrated our success at Burgerville USA in Woodland, Washington. When the server asked if I wanted whipped cream on my hot fudge sundae, I thought: "Heck yeah! I just expended a zillion calories climbing MSH!"

Will I do this again? C has his instructions: if I ever talk about climbing MSH again, he is to take me out to the back 40 and put me out of my misery.

The Fallout

 Read about the Eagle Creek Fire here.

a favorite Oregon trailhead

The Forest Service has said that the Gorge trails will be closed until at least next summer. What a damper that puts on next year's hiking season. I hope the closure doesn't last too far into summer.

The alternative is to hike on the Washington side, which was not much damaged in the conflagration.  The drive is further; the hikes are wonderful. Wildflowers come to the Washington trails earlier than the Oregon trails--Washington basks in sunshine. Coyote Wall, Dog Mountain, Hamilton Mountain, Cape Horn, and other trails are delightful. Waterfalls are not as profuse there, but open views abound.

On another note, those who are responsible for the fire have been charged. I hope their sentence involves working to re-build trails and restore the environment in the Gorge.

another frequented trail in Oregon

this one takes you to Triple Falls and beyond

Dog Mtn is a Washington favorite; it is one tough hike and has killer views from the top at 3000 feet

Hamilton Mountain: I hike up here annually and never tire of the view from the top

(www.adventurestrong.com)

Cape Horn extends into the Columbia River on the Washington side and makes for a pleasant hike

Up In Smoke

 Punch Bowl Falls

from www.oregonhikers.org

Our famed Columbia Gorge, a magnet for hikers, climbers, sailors, swimmers, skiers and sightseers, transformed this fall from a mecca to a monster in one short afternoon. Over Labor Day weekend, a foolish, careless group of teens threw a firecracker into the parched forest near Punch Bowl Falls (pictured above) on the Eagle Creek Trail, causing an explosion of flame that consumed  50,000 acres in the beloved Gorge.

The fire burned for six weeks. Even 30 miles away here in Beaverton, we choked on smoke. Only the first rainfall of the season put a damper on the spread of the flames, despite the efforts of hundreds of firefighters working like crazy with tons of equipment. Interstate 84 was closed for three weeks; the river was closed; towns were evacuated. The fire burned to the highway and jumped the wide Columbia River into Washington. After the fire, thousands of trees in danger of toppling were removed. Special teams climbed the burned-over slopes to dislodge rocks that no longer had vegetation to hold them in place. Mudslides are expected once the rainy season gets going. Firefighters miraculously saved the iconic CCC structures, including Multnomah Falls Lodge.

Flames spread so rapidly that 150 waterfall enthusiasts at Punch Bowl could not hike down to the trail head that afternoon. Dressed in skimpy summer clothing and even flip-flops, and without much food or supplies, they were ill-prepared for the ordeal of spending a cold night on the trail. The following day the group hiked 12 miles and a grueling 3500 feet up the mountain (through flaming embers) to where the Forest Service could transport them back to their cars.

Last week I drove through the Gorge and saw the devastation. Stands of healthy forest blend in with swaths of brown trees and blackened spars, tunnels are burned out, roadside railings are smashed from fallen trees. "Thanks" to the fire burning off vegetation, it's easier now to catch a glimpse of majestic Multnomah Falls from behind the wheel of a speeding car.

More thoughts tomorrow.

Before and after photographs:

 (photo from traveljapanblog.com)

Crown Point on the right

Multnomah Falls

(photo from ecoecoequa.wordpress.com)

hikers stranded near Punch Bowl were guided out the next day by Forest Service 

 (from the Spokesman Review)

  from the Washington side of the Gorge

(Portland Tribune)

above Oneonta Creek

I'm pretty sure that knob on the right is Angel's Rest, which is one marvelous hiking destination; from that point you can see downtown Portland on a clear day

trail to Angel's Rest

(www.fireengineering.com)

highway crews using the interstate as a work area; note stumps on hill

what the sun looked like from our home during the fires

Here's one hiker's account of being trapped on the trail by fire