A jewel of a truck is currently on display at the High Desert Museum in Bend, Oregon. Artist Laurel Porcari covered this 1941 Ford panel truck with a colorful mosaic of tiles. This piece is titled Voyager.
On one side you can see the iconic volcanoes that border Oregon’s High Desert.
On the other side, you’ll see a lunar landscape, with views of a planet-filled sky.
The artistry of this piece looks beautiful from any angle.
In July, I hiked the 2.6-mile South Falls Loop trail through the wilderness of Silver Falls State Park, Oregon. This route, past South Falls and Lower South Falls, is part of the Trail of Ten Falls. See the map of the trails at the end of this post.
I parked in the lot near South Falls, hiking north along the Canyon Trail and then heading south along Maple Ridge Trail. Though I’ve visited the park before, I had my dogs, and they are only allowed on a few trails. This time I was going solo.
I took the short trail to the South Falls overlook from the parking area. You get great views from above of the 177-foot-tall waterfall.
If you have limited time, take the ¼-mile trail to the South Falls overlook. If you have more time, walk the 1-mile loop trail behind the falls.
After a brief stop at the overlook, I walked to the lower trail that goes behind the falls. Cool (literally)!
If birds can glide for long periods of time, then… why can’t I?
Orville Wright
Wright Flyer replica, Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum, McMinnville, Oregon
Almost Wordless Wednesday
A fall view by the Bend Whitewater Park in Bend, Oregon. The path leads to two benches surrounded by fall leaves. You can also see a few realistic-looking Canada Geese sculptures in the foreground.
Green up close
In triangular Vanilla Leaf leaves
And tiny Huckleberry leaves
Green
In splitting Gingko leaves
Green up close
In frond fans of Maidenhair Fern
Yes, I know you’ve all been waiting to see more of my blooper photos. This is where I share pictures that don’t quite fit into any category so I try to add a little humor to them. Here are a few 2023 bloopers to entertain you. 😀
“Am I still your good girl?”
I believe I finally found the true cause of global warming.
Continue readingI saw a scary carriage at Beyond the Ranch, an antique store in Redmond, Oregon. The skeletal coachman guides his skeletal horse while the occupant waves a bony hand. A frightful sight for your Halloween!
Sunday Stills Monthly Color Challenge (SSMCC) – Black or Metallic
I saw this creative beer bike rack in Bend at On Tap. This is one of seven “pods” where food trucks can park. Customers can enjoy a wide variety of food from the trucks and beer and other beverages on tap inside the main building.
I LOVE the Rush’s Squares pizza food truck here! My favorite is the Pesto Margherita pizza.
I saw this jailbird jay while out walking in Bend. It perched on a rock behind the heavy bars of a fence around the Hayden Homes Amphitheatre.
This is a California Scrub-jay. Here’s a closer look.
In 2016, the American Ornithological Union (AOU) split the Western Scrub-jay into two species, the California Scrub-jay, Aphelocoma californica, and Woodhouse’s Scrub-jay, Aphelocoma woodhouseii. They appear very similar. This post by Andy Birch describes and shows the characteristics of each species.
This a fine feather I found while walking in a park in Bend, Oregon. This large feather belonged to some kind of raptor.
Last Saturday, we had an Oregon Outback morning. We drove south of Silver Lake, Oregon to get a good view of the annular eclipse. Unfortunately, the clouds never cleared during the peak minutes of the eclipse. For today’s One-to-Three Photo Processing Challenge, I decided to make lemonade out of lemons.
Beautiful cloudscapes hung over the land, highlighting the Basin and Range topography. We stood in the middle of a basin surrounded by low mountains and buttes.
I used Corel PaintShopPro 2021 for different photo processing effects. In the original image I slightly increased the contrast and fill light and cropped the edges.
The first two show the original photograph and the same picture with a Black and White effect. For this image I went to Effects>Photo Effects>Black and White Film. I used the BW Heavy setting because it works well on clouds.
The next two show the original photograph and the same picture with a neon effect. For this image I went to Adjust>Hue & Saturation>Hue map>Neon glow. I liked how this effect enhances the mysticism associated with High Desert environments.
Continue readingThere are many differences in nature.
Skies…
May be foggy and humid near ocean beaches,
Or sprinkled with clouds over an arid land.
Water…
May pound down mountainsides in narrow waterfalls,
Here’s a pretty lavender-colored High Desert dahlia seen on a garden tour in Bend, Oregon last year. These popular plants prefer full sun and good drainage. Though this one was seen in July, they are treasured for blooming well into the fall months.
This was one of the many flowers in bloom we saw on the tour. I think the color of this one made it my favorite High Desert dahlia seen that day.
We saw this large Sitka spruce, Picea sitchensis, tree at Fort Clatsop, Oregon. This is where the Lewis and Clark expedition spent a long, wet winter in 1806. Lewis noted how this tree was commonly 27 feet in girth, with some trees reaching 36 feet around. This tree’s height averages 125-180 feet, and may reach over 250 feet. Sitka spruce can live up to 800 years.
Indigenous people used parts of spruce trees in several ways. Roots and cedar bark were woven into baskets and hats. The pitch was used as a varnish, to waterproof canoes, and chewed like gum. Various parts were used to treat diarrhea, constipation, and back aches. Sitka spruce was thought to possess “mystical powers and provided protection against evil thoughts.”
The tree’s fine-grained wood is both strong and lightweight. It is used in turbine blades, aircraft, sailboats, racing sculls, and oars. its unique qualities also make it a favorite in making musical instruments, including guitars, harps, violins, pianos, and flutes created by Native Americans.
Here’s the view as we were driving across the Columbia River into Hood River, Oregon on a recent trip. You can see Mount Hood peeking over the hills on the left side of the picture.
We happened to be there when the annual Association of Wind + Watersports Industries event was taking place. Here’s a picture of the Hood River Bridge from the Oregon side. Can you see all the windsurfers out there?
lamplit paths tremble
a bridge arises from green
ripples of summer
Weekly Haiku Challenge (WHC) – Lamp & path
Here’s a picture of a white cosmos up close, taken a couple of days ago in Bend, Oregon. Cooler weather is on the way so it may soon disappear. They are one of my favorite flowers!
Macro Monday (MM)
Flower of the Day (FOTD)
When I looked through my Oregon photos, it was hard to narrow it down to only ten pictures for this week’s Lens-Artists Photo Challenge of Tell us why. These are the photos I chose, shown by category.
Sometimes you take a picture and when you look at it later on a larger screen, you say, “Wow!”
I took this picture of an old homestead without fussing with the settings first. It almost looks like one of those old-time stereoscope images. I like this photo because it captured a glimpse of history.
I took a lot of pictures of the Spruce Goose aircraft in McMinnville and described it in a recent post. When I saw the lines in this photo, I knew it would look great in black and white.
I noticed I had many portraits of majestic mountains when I browsed through my Oregon photos.
The first photo, is of Steens Mountain, in southeast Oregon. The lupine was in bloom so I focused on its purple flowers. This 50-mile long mountain is one of my favorite places in Oregon. I like taking pictures that show its powerful presence.
When I went on the High Desert Garden Tour in Bend, Oregon in July 2022, I was impressed by a couple edibles & more gardens. Their yards had edible plants in the front, sides, and back.
These are gooseberries growing on a shrub in full sun. I remember a gooseberry plant at one of my childhood homes.
These radishes were in a raised bed. We grow them as well and I love their spicy taste.
Raspberries! One of my favorite fruits. Over the years, our dogs have enjoyed eating them off the vines so we have to pick them fast.
The Valley Gorge HUB mural, in The Dalles, Oregon, is one of my most favorite murals. This mural was painted in 2018 by Blaine Fontana, with help from Toma Villa, Jeremy Nichols, and Jeff Sheridan. This long mural is on E 1st St.
I took pictures of each section so you can see it more closely. This part features a Trout, Salmon, and Sturgeon.
This section shows a Black Bear, Bighorn sheep, and Cougar. A Yellow Warbler photo bombed this one.
This part shows a Yellow Warbler, Osprey, Blue Jay, and Raven.
The last section shows a Monarch Butterfly and a Chickadee. There’s a mural by another artist around the corner on this end of the building.
I’ve visited The Dalles in the past and didn’t realize the Valley Gorge HUB mural wrapped around the building. Here’s the mural on other parts of the building. You can see a Mule Deer, Red-winged Blackbirds, and an Egret.
I took pictures in The Dalles in 2022 of the Northwest Mural Fest. They now have 33 murals in the downtown area.
Here’s an updated map of their locations. I like how they added a red line to show which side of the building has murals. This map was updated in January of 2023.
Where do you go when you’re looking for a quick recharge? To the National Neon Sign Museum in The Dalles, Oregon, of course!
On the main floor, you’ll see a rainbow of neon colors. The signs on display are from the late 1800s through the 1960s.
Do you recognize any of these iconic signs?
How about this wall filled with Coca Cola signs?
These three sandstone formations are located in Tillamook Bay, north of Garibaldi, Oregon. Known locally as The Three Graces, they’re also called Crab Rocks. If the tides are low, they’re a great place to explore when out kayaking. Check tides before venturing there.
The Oregon coast has several seastacks near the shore. These are smaller in stature, but still very photogenic.
A Malheur view at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters in Oregon.
I saw this Burns Times Herald window in Burns, Oregon last April. Paintings of birds by schoolchildren decorated the Herald’s windows for the Harney County Migratory Bird Festival. Colorful paper streamers hung in the background.
I found paintings of ravens, jays, waxwings, eagles, hummingbirds, kestrels, warblers, and nuthatches. Can you find them?
I also liked the newspaper’s motto on their window. “Covering Harney County Like the Sage Brush.” The Burns Times Herald has been serving this community since 1887.
Monday Window (MW)
Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (FOWC) – Paint
Do you need to weed? It’s not something we want to do, but it’s something we have to do.
Some weeds are pretty, but spread aggressively. I call this one the “Root of all Evil” because it can be hard to pull and develops seed heads almost as soon as it pops out of the ground.
About an acre of our land is planted with landscaping, fruit, or vegetable plants. We need to weed often, especially in the spring. Today I’ll share some tips and tools that may help you when you need to weed.
I have tried several seats while weeding, and this is my favorite. You can sit on it as a seat or flip it over and kneel on it.
My dogs like when I sit on it because then I’m at their level. Shelby thinks it’s the perfect opportunity to play fetch with me.
“Monkey tree can’t pinch me!” I remember saying that as a kid every time we drove past one of these odd trees on the way to our grandparents’ house. We would try to be the first one to pinch our siblings before they could pinch us. Did anyone else play that game?
Monkey puzzle trees, Araucaria auracana, are native to Chile and Argentina but grow well in many parts of the world. In their native habitat, they grow to a height of 100-130 feet, but in gardens in North America mature at 30-40 feet.
Their common name originated in 1850 when Charles Austin, who was visiting a friend’s garden in England, remarked, “It would puzzle a monkey to climb that.” Those triangular leaves have sharp edges and tips!
I took this picture of a foggy day at Boiler Bay, Oregon a couple weeks ago.
In 1910, the J. Marhoffer schooner ran aground here. Its engine caught on fire and the fuel tanks exploded, sending debris everywhere. During extremely low tides, you can still see its boiler, for which this site is named.
Last September, we visited the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum, located in McMinnville, Oregon. This large facility is a great place to visit, whether you’re an aviator or not.
I featured their star attraction, the Spruce Goose, in a previous post. It dwarfs the other aircraft there. In several of my images, you’ll see parts of the Spruce Goose towering overhead.
I’ve divided this post by sections shown on the Museum map at the end of this post.
Several of the aircraft in this and other sections are replicas of the original. The first is a flying machine as envisioned by Leonardo Da Vinci, 400 years before the Wright brothers.
The next plane is a replica of a Curtiss Pusher.
This de Havilland DH-4 aircraft was used to deliver mail in the 1920s, as weather permitted.
Continue readingSouth Falls waterfall washing away worries at Silver Falls State Park, Oregon
South Falls from behind
A glistening serpent slithers through a natural frame of duckweed and sedges
White calla lilies, surrounded by leathery green leaves, enlighten
Crimson canna lily leaves punctuate a layered landscape of greenness
Continue readingFluttering into a wild iris meadow
White-faced Ibis alight
Curved bills preen and probe
Iridescent feathers catch fading light
Casting rainbows over dusty hills
Awakening dormant wildflowers
Yearning for an opportunity
To shine
I saw this beautiful Western Tiger Swallowtail on a penstemon flower in my front yard recently. We try to plant flowers that attract bees, butterflies, and other pollinators. We’ve seen LOTS of butterflies this year.
This Curtiss JN-4A Jenny, shown without fabric covering, shows the structure of wings. This is one of the many aircraft on display at the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum in McMinnville, Oregon.
Here’s an informational poster next to the plane. Note the photo of a couple playing tennis on its wings!
Earlier this month, we went to the local Summer Festival here in Bend, Oregon.
If it’s a summer festival, you might see fairies walking down the street, right? Are those blurry spots behind them spots on my windshield? Nope, I’m pretty sure that’s a cloud of fairy dust. 😉
As the sign says, this festival features music, food, and art. It takes place downtown on three city blocks, plus a couple side streets. It’s estimated that 70,000 people attend this two and a half day festival.
The art booths have everything from jewelry and landscape art, to pillows featuring an image of Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Various businesses feature their products and services in the Bend Business Showcase section.
Continue readingWhen I think about waterlilies, I think about perfection on the water. Delicate blossoms radiate over thick floating leaves. No more words needed.
These Canna Lily leaves are beautiful up close. Lovely shapes, lines, and colors.
Macro Monday (MM)
Flower of the Day (FOTD)
