Oregon – Riveted

Airstreamin’ in Wine Country

Laura Domela — Sat, 24 Oct 2015 14:49:27 +0000

We dusted off the Airstream on Thursday morning and headed down to the Willamette Valley wine country (only a little over an hour from our house in Portland) to meet up with some friends for the weekend.

When we got to our RV storage unit, everything was just as we'd left it and there were no big issues. Pretty good after sitting for a year in storage! The tires needed a little air, the clocks needed new batteries, and the fridge light needs a new bulb, but other than that everything was ready to go.

We are camping at the Willamette Wine Country RV Resort and so far, we have mostly remembered how to do everything. Campgrounds are definitely noisier than anchorages and mooring buoys, but it's still fun to be out in the trailer. (And there are no ferry wakes tossing you awake at 7am!)

Kevin and I had a reservation for dinner on Thursday night at the Joel Palmer House (thank you to Kevin's mom for the sweet gift card!)

The Joel Palmer House, in Dayton, Oregon:

Our table:

Because this is truffle country, we did the Mushroom Madness tasting menu, and because we're in pinot noir country, we shared a bottle of Methven Family Vineyards Pinot Noir. All was delicious and it was a nice evening.

In the morning, we met up with our friend Kathy Hardersen and her son Kyle. (Kyle just bought a new Airstream International 25' and is parked right next to us, and Kathy left her Airstream at home and is staying here in one of The Vintages.) We had breakfast at our trailer, and then went over to Sokol Blosser for some wine tasting on the patio.

Sokol Blosser has a gorgeous tasting room and patio, and we couldn't ask for better mid-October weather!

We were there for a couple hours just visiting and playing cards and tasting wine. Kathy is a wine club member at Sokol Blosser, so we got a nice complimentary charcuterie tray during our card game:

We brought back a deck of cards from the Trickster Company in Juneau, Alaska. This is the Tlingit language edition, and they're fabulous to play with!

We had some lunch at the Red Hills Market, then went to Penner-Ash Wine Cellars for another tasting (and met up with more of Kathy's family). I didn't take any photos at Penner-Ash, but they too have a gorgeous place up on the hill with a fantastic view of the valley. We really enjoyed several of their wines, and left with four bottles: a 2013 Willamette Valley Pinot Noir, a 2014 Viognier (served at the White House State Dinner a few weeks ago), a 2013 Oregon Syrah, and a 2013 Rubeo (70% pinot noir, 30% syrah).

We decided to finally let Kyle have something HE wanted drink, so we stopped at Deception Brewing for a bit. (Kevin and I didn't try any of their beer though…next time!)

Dinner last night with the entire Hardersen family (table for 9) was at Ruddick/Wood in Newberg and was a blast. We always have so much fun with these guys. So. Much. Laughing!!

We started with a Honey Badger and a Whiskey Sour, and shared the duck confit hushpuppies (the winner) and a grilled octopus salad for starters, and the Fishermen's Stew and the Chicken Roulade (the winner) for entrees.

Today, we've got some more friends (Lisa and George, in their Argosy motorhome) joining us here and we'll probably visit two more wineries today…maybe ride our bikes around a bit, and just spend more time visiting and catching up.

It's definitely nice to be back in the Airstream, but I miss the boat and the water a little bit (and the rocking!). I think we're going to need to revisit the boondocking side of RV travel a bit more next time we set out for a longer trip…get away from the traffic noise and the leaf blowers and lawn mowers.

Sauvie Island Bike Ride

Laura Domela — Mon, 04 Aug 2014 00:22:58 +0000

This morning we did our usual hike in the Arboretum (about 4 miles), but we figured we should really get a bike ride in too, since we're doing the 36 mile Bridge Pedal route next Sunday (one week from today) and we really haven't been riding that much lately. So this afternoon we loaded the tandem into the back of the truck and headed for Sauvie Island.

We've had our tandem for about 9-10 years and it's a great bike. (Notice, it's ALSO aluminum!!) It's a Santana Sovereign.

There's a really nice 12 mile loop around the south end of the island that looks like this:

Sauvie Island is the largest island along the Columbia River at 26,000 acres, and is predominantly farms and wildlife refuge. It's flat and has fairly low traffic so it's a great place to cycle.

Here are some photos of our ride, and oh yeah, it was 90 degrees out. Hot!!

There are several farm markets out here where you can get fresh produce and/or pick your own berries and flowers.

Corn maze and pumpkin patch opens on Labor Day:

I saw these cows. They were eating grass, just like it says.

Champoeg State Park

Laura Domela — Wed, 02 Jul 2014 13:35:25 +0000

Well here we are camping in our own back yard again! Or…30 minutes from our backyard anyway (Champoeg State Park), and since we can't keep our Airstream at home (driveway too steep, nowhere to turn around) we'll have to settle for this.

Sucks, doesn't it? Oh wait, it doesn't. We're here with some family and having a lovely time. Last night we grilled some salmon and zucchini (after it cooled down from the 100 degrees it was yesterday), and then built a fire for some marshmallow roasting and a couple ghost stories complete with scary reenactment by a lantern-carrying 6 year old with a fabulous, dark sense of humor.

Super fun!

Today we're going to go over to Cora's Crop to pick some blueberries, do some more work teaching the little one to ride her pink cruiser, cook some yum food, and probably more marshmallows and ghost stories will happen later tonight.

“Bike Trail” at Silver Falls State Park

Laura Domela — Mon, 23 Jun 2014 01:14:32 +0000

Okay so when we were on our way through Silverton, we stopped at a liquor store to pick up some Aperol for making some spritzes at the campground. (They didn't even know what Aperol was, so it was a bust, but anyway.) The liquor store was next door to a market and there was a sign up on the street signage for what I assume was the bakery in the market, advertising donuts, and it said:

"Voted" Best Donut

Do the quotation marks mean that it wasn't really a "vote"? Did only the person making the sign "vote"? Was it "voted" for by the employees of the bakery? What does it meeeeaaaannnnn???

This afternoon we decided to take a break from reading books and watching the World Cup to go check out the "bike trail" at Silver Falls State Park. It was very pretty, a short 5.5 mile loop from the campground, but not at all a nice path for bikes, unless you like a lot of debris, total pine needle coverage, and TONS of cracks and bumps and short steep hills. (Could be okay for mountain biking, but it's paved, so not really. Also: lots of pedestrians.)

Super pretty though. I was able to click off a photo during one of the several smoothish bits where I didn't need both hands:

On the way back, there's a spot where the "bike trail" crosses the road, so we opted to take the road back to the campground instead of the rest of the "bike trail". It was a very good choice!! At first it was a short steady uphill in a low gear, but then the whole rest of the way was wheeeeeee…..downhill, smooth road, nice curves, and no traffic. Perfect!

Route/elevation from the campground:

More Banks-Vernonia Trail

Laura Domela — Fri, 20 Jun 2014 19:16:55 +0000

After we finished up some work today we headed out on the bikes and decided to ride to Banks (the other half of the Banks-Vernonia Trail ride that we did yesterday). This is such a great trail. These are all taken with my iPhone right from my bike-mount while riding (with the exception of the railroad bridge one, cuz…well…you'll see):

That railroad bridge was super fun to ride over. It's SO FAR DOWN when you stop and look over the edge! Oh yeah, the trail from Stub Stewart to Banks is ALL downhill. You know what that means…not so fast on the way home!

We had a nice frosty coffee concoction at the Banks Trail Cafe in Banks and then headed back to camp.

Now were going to work a bit, shower, and then meet up with Aluminarium (they're a few spots down from us tonight!) for some happy hour and dinner (and a lot of catching up!)

Here's the map and elevation of our ride: 21.5 miles

Walton Lake and Painted Hills

Laura Domela — Mon, 16 Jun 2014 17:35:57 +0000

After we left Detroit Lake we met up with Tiffani and Deke over at Walton Lake Campground in the Ochoco National Forest in Central Oregon. This is a gorgeous little lake with campsites on both sides. There are no hookups (and only a tiny bit of Verizon service).

We arrived first and did a couple loops around the campground looking for spots. There were a couple of spots (not together) that looked potentially not occupied or reserved and just as we were trying to decide what to do, the camp host lady drove up in her little car:

Camp Host Lady: Are you looking for a campsite?

Us: Yes, we're actually looking for two sites, for two nights…our friends are meeting us here.

Camp Host Lady: Well, I'll tell you what. Why do you go park over in the small group site, and I'll just charge you the $15 per night same as everyone else, instead of the $100 a night that site is normally. There's plenty of room, but just one fire ring, and if I need to put someone else over there I may have to do that. If that's okay with you, you're welcome to have it.

Us: That's fine with us…we're friendly! Thank you so much!

We set up camp and pretty soon Tiffani and Deke arrived and it was a perfect spot. I mean, it wasn't on the lake or anything, but weekend campers without reservations can't be choosers, right?

Pretty sweet! We set up the Traeger(s) and the hammock(s) and the chairs(s) and we were ready to get to some serious lounging and visiting!

Tiffani and Deke (and Lucy) making fire while Kevin swings in a hammock:

Walking the trail around Walton Lake:

On Saturday after a delicious iron skillet breakfast prepared by Deke, we headed out to check out the town of Michell, Oregon, and the Painted Hills. Mitchell is tiny and most of it is in this one photo:

We went in "Judy's Place" and Tiffani found a tiny pair of salt and pepper shakers that said Mitchell, OR on them:

Check out the paint surface of this place:

Arty sidewalk shadow:

And here's the obligatory photo of the "Whole in the Wall" curiosity shop that is never open and is owned by the trust of someone who's long gone. Apparently the city wants to tear it down, but one local told us it's really what Mitchell is known for and they can't tear it down!

Kevin was getting gas while we were looking at junk antiques and had a fabulous story to bring back along with his gas. (Regular was $4.19/gallon)

Kevin (making small talk): Gas prices going up or own these days?

Old guy selling the gas (with grumpy old man tone): Up. Always Up.

After the 4 minutes it took for us to see all of Mitchell, we headed into the Painted Hills.

This place is pretty spectacular. We did the short hike out to the overlook:

Next we drove a little further to another trail (this one quite short, partially on boardwalk where you could get up close but not too close to the brightly colored hills):

Here's what that texture looks like close up:

And see this lavendar part in the foreground here? That part is rhyolite flow and it's 40 MILLION YEARS OLD!!! (Shh, we touched it.):

Reds and golds:

Another freaky shot of the path:

Pretty neat! We headed back to camp after oooohing and aaaahing our way through Painted Hills and once back, we decided to get our bikes out and ride around the lake.

It was a short ride, but still it led straight to some hammock time. Here's my view from the hammock:

We read books and magazines and made fire and good conversation and enjoyed our afternoon and evening very much. We cooked a feast for dinner: tenderloins, seared scallops, pork chops, asparagus, and baked potatoes (we had leftovers, of course).

In the morning, we all headed to Redmond and then waved and honked as Tiffani and Deke headed for Bend and we headed back to Portland. I didn't tear up at all. (Total lie.)

We meet so many people while we're traveling around the country the way we do, but it feels pretty rare to meet people we'll probably be lifelong friends with. We are so grateful our paths crossed with these guys a few years ago when they moved to Seattle. Bon voyage, Tiffani and Deke! We'll see you soon!

Oh yeah, and this thing (!!!!)…a coathook in the ladies room of a mexican restaurant where we had lunch in Sisters, OR:

Kevin says his legs and arm just must have broken off. I checked. I assure you that is not the case. I'll concede this this could have been intentionally modified by an artist/ironworker, but it was not an accident. At all.

Quick Trip to Central Oregon

Laura Domela — Thu, 12 Jun 2014 23:07:14 +0000

We went and got the Airstream this afternoon and headed out! We're going to meet up with Tiffani and Deke tomorrow (in the Painted Hills/John Day Fossil Beds area) as they make their way to the other side of the country. That flight to Orcas was great, but we're super excited to get to spend a bit more time with them!

We'll spend tonight at Detroit Lake and then head out in the morning to see if we can snag a couple of cool spots somewhere near the pretty stuff. It's rainy here, but it's lovely and quiet. An hour ago there were 4 geese, 16 goslings, and one duck wandering around our campsite scroungin' for dinner. Cute!!

A Birthday Surprise!

Laura Domela — Sun, 04 May 2014 15:58:19 +0000

Yesterday (May 3) was my birthday (yay, birthdays!). Kevin told me on Friday that he had a surprise planned starting the next morning. He also told me to pack a bag for a couple days that included biking stuff and something to wear to a nice dinner out, and to be dressed like I might be going on a hike (with shoes that could get muddy) — oh, and that we needed to leave the house by 4:30am.

!!!!!

We had an opening night play to attend the night before (where we were shooting environment/audience shots before the show and during intermission for their brochure and publicity stuff) so as soon as bows were taken, we hightailed it home and went to bed by 11pm, because, um, 4am.

Alarm sounded, espresso was consumed, and off we went into the pre-dawn darkness.

We ended up at Sportsman Airpark in Newberg, Oregon at 5am and we were apparently a little early. Well let's see…we were at an airport, but not OUR airport. (It had occurred to me we might be flying somewhere with the bikes, but we'd need to be at the airport where we keep our plane, and we weren't.)

Kevin: Any guessses?

Me: Hmm. A glider ride? No, they don't do gliders here. A helicopter?

Kevin: Nope.

Me: A float plane?

Kevin: Do you see any water?

Me: (stumped)

At some point a few other cars trickled in, and eventually one of them pulled up next to us on my side, looking like they wanted to chat. We rolled down the window and the woman driving said "Is this the place for the balloon rides?"

Aha! A balloon! I didn't know they did that here either! Sweet! Apparently we were going to help set up the balloons, go up for a hot air balloon ride over the Willamette Valley, land, help take balloons down, and then finish with a champagne brunch there on the field. How fun!! And what a great surprise!!!

We waited with the other cars for another half hour or so. Seems the balloon people were a bit late. After a little while longer, the same woman who chatted with us before came walking over holding her phone, looking kinda pissed. We rolled down the window and she informed us that (1) she was impatient and had called the balloon people, (2) they apparently weren't going to fly today, (3) they were supposed to have called us all the night before to tell us (!!!) and had not, (4) it was her daughter's birthday present and they'd gotten up at 4am too. She gave us the number so we too could call too if we wanted, then she walked on over to the next car to continue the stream of bad news.

Kevin called in and the balloon people were very nice and apologetic, but no, they weren't flying. They were very sorry no one had called to tell us the night before.

Well, shoot. So there we were at 6am on a Saturday, at a little airfield in Newberg Oregon, with nothing to do until the 3pm check in time at the B&B Kevin had reserved for us in the Willamette Valley wine country.

I figured Kevin was far more disappointed and frustrated that I would be (I wasn't, actaully…it was a very sweet thing to plan) so I got out my iPhone and looked around at the map and found what looked like a park along a river with some trails. Great! We could get in an early morning hike (since we were dressed for it and all).

This is Joe Dancer Park in McMinnville. There's a nice trail along the river, as well as giganic well-manicured soccer fields and other sports facilities. The river trail is 1.5 miles each way so we did a nice 3 mile hike.

We stuck to the trail along the river, with one exception: the skate park! This place was gorgeous in the early morning light:

And here's Kevin shreddin' sans skateboard:

We finished our hike, looked for a breakfast spot (Yelp) and settled on the Crescent Cafe in downtown McMinnville — good food, made fresh from scratch (delicious breads and house-made sausage).

Okay! Three-mile hike…check! Breakfast…check! Time…9am! Hmmm.

So guess what we did? We went down the street and had manicures and pedicures at Thumbs Up Nail Salon while we sat in massage chairs, watching The Incredible Hulk on a big screen television. After all that we still had a few hours to kill, so we decided to go over to the Airstream (in storage about 30 minutes away) to pick up Kevin's bike lock cable.

I was feeling pretty tired (I'm not the greatest on too little sleep) and so I thought (and said): "Hey, we could also…while we're at the Airstream…take a NAP!!" So that's exactly what we did. We got the bike lock cable, crawled into bed, and took a two hour nap (in the Airstream…in the storage garage). It was lovely!

Now we were rested and finally it was about time to head over to the Lobenhaus B&B! We arrived a little early (their office opens for check-in at 3pm) so we got out the iPad and sat in the car in the garden parking lot and watched the Kentucky Derby (via Slingbox and our cable box at home). Ahhh, technology!

Lobenhaus is in Carlton, Oregon. It's a lovely bed & breakfast with 6 rooms and a vineyard on 28 acres. Our room has a deck overlooking Millican Creek and the woods, and the owners Joe & Shari Lobenstein are wonderful. Here's the view from our room (yes, it's raining, but look how GREEN!):

We got all checked in and situated and decided we had enough time to do a little wine tasting before 5pm closing time for most wineries. We headed to The Eyrie Vineyards first, in McMinnville:

The tasting room was packed, and we liked the wine (we brought home two pinots). Next was Domenio IV Wines, not too far from Eyrie.

We loved the wines at Dominio IV, and came home with two bottles each of two different temperanillos and a pinot. Ryan (our pourer, and also the wine club guy) was pouring to a pretty full tasting room there as well. He was super helpful and gave a great amount of information about each wine to everyone. 5pm in the tasting room is usually a little…um…rowdy (or can be, anyway). We were some of the only patrons who hadn't been tasting wine all day.

We headed back to Lobenhaus to hang out a bit and shower, and then it was time for dinner. Kevin had a 7:45pm reservation for us at The Joel Palmer House.

From the Joel Palmer House website: "The Joel Palmer House is on the National as well as Oregon Historic Register. Joel Palmer was one of Oregon’s preeminent pioneers leaving Indiana in 1845 to make his long way west. As leader of one of three wagon trains headed for the Northwest, Palmer soon exhibited the leadership qualities for which he became famous.

Joel Palmer co-founded the town of Dayton in 1848 and built this home in 1857. It is said that it is named after the hometown of Chris Taylor, a close friend."

View into the back door of the kitchen:

The service here is wonderful, and spot-on. It's formal and elegant, while at the same time being completely friendly and down-to-earth. We arrived early so our table wasn't ready (no big deal) but they apologized and brought us a glass of sparkling wine to sip while we waited, and we were seated about five minutes later at the same lovely table by the window where we dined the first time we visited. We opted again to do the "mushroom madness" tasting menu (so good!)

The sommelier showed us the wine list and pointed out a section called "Orphans" — these are wines where there is only one bottle left. The bottles on this list are crossed out by hand as they are ordered. Love this! We chose a 2008 Monks Gate pinot noir and it was delicious and went well with all of the courses (minus the palate cleanser of dueling gazpacho soups). This fabulous meal ended with an extra dessert of some kind of chocolate truffles, and they were good but what was far more interesting to me were the accompanying candy cap mushroom POP ROCKS (because I'm 12!) Mushroom-flavored pop rocks!! I need a jar of those.

Such a fun day!!

Super Taco!

Laura Domela — Tue, 08 Apr 2014 19:31:47 +0000

We headed out to grab some lunch (and check on the progress of our bike tweaks) and ended up at Super Taco over on West 11th, just down the block from Bike Friday. Yelpers said it was good. Really good. Like, "OMG I haven't found good Mexican food in Eugene since I moved here from San Diego and this makes me miss San Diego less" kind of reviews. That's a pretty good review, having had lots of great Mexican food in San Diego. We gave it a shot and tried a variety of tacos and it was solid.

L to R: Chorizo, Carnitas, Carne Asada, y Pescado.

It's in a little strip mall and looks like this inside:

(It was late so it wasn't packed, like everyone on Yelp said it was during normal lunch hours.)

So there you go: Lunch. At Super Taco. If you're ever visiting Bike Friday and need to grab lunch (or breakfast), you can walk 5 minutes one way to Starbucks and/or Subway, or walk the other direction to Super Taco for breakfast burritos or tacos.

We Made it to Ashland

Laura Domela — Fri, 04 Apr 2014 21:23:44 +0000

We did a long drive today (6+ hours) and arrived safely in Ashland, Oregon. We're at Emigrant Lake and it's lovely.

It just started sprinkling so I think we'll head out for some groceries and a little exploring.