Eugene Weekend

Friday morning, we drove to Eugene for a two night stay at the Eugene Whiteaker International Hostel. Gail had several Halloween activities lined up for us. Eugene is a happening place, what with the University of Oregon and all that it brings.

We took separate cars as Gail was going up to Portland to see one of her old punk rock heroes, John Lydon, formerly known as Johnny Rotten, lead singer of the Sex Pistols, perform in concert at a small venue on Sunday night. She reports that it was, "More than brilliant!"

We met at the natural history museum on the university campus, which is well done with knowledgeable docents on hand. From there, we checked in at the hostel in the Whiteaker district, which is home to starving artists, and in the process of trying to become a destination for restaurants and breweries.  It is still pretty rough around the edges, however.

 Whiteaker International Hostel

 "The Whit" is known for its mature street trees, side-walk damage be damned.

Friday evening, we had tickets for Dracula at The Very Little Theater. It was a surprisingly polished performance - nice theater, great set, and classy performances.

 Saturday, we did a walk along the Willamette River, passing through the Owen Rose Garden.

 In the garden is this Black Tartarian Cherry Tree that is approximately 170 years old.  In 1977, it measured 15 ft. 10 in. in circumference, 60 feet tall, and 80 feet wide.

The farmers market is about the best I've ever seen - great produce at great prices.

After the farmers market, it was onto the the first annual casket race.  Some of the entries got a little squirrelly coming down the hill. 

 There were 40 entries, with some of the casket chassis offered as kits, like these two racers.

Just as this casket passed us, it collapsed a wheel, and it veered sharply into a hay bale. Unfortunately, some kids were standing on the wrong side of the bale and a little girl was hit. She was wheeled off for medical attention.  We do think the event needs to tighten up its safety protocols.

 We toured the pit area. Some of these casket cars had some engineering going on.

 This ship casket had automotive type suspension and steering.

 This iron and steel beast was really fast by the time it got down to the bottom of the hill.  With all its weight, however, we thought it could be lethal if it got off track.

 A real art piece, this one.

After watching for awhile, we headed up the road to see the venue of the evening's performance we'd be attending.

 The Shelton McMurphey Johnson House is now a museum of sorts.

There were displays of unusual caskets, funerary items like ice boards for keeping a body cold, and books of photos of families posing with their dead members posed and dressed to look alive, apparently a fad in the 1800's.

 Then it was back to the festivities at the casket races.  The races were over, but there was live music, pumpkin carving, and getting cider or beer at nearby WildCraft Cider Works.

We started noticing that a lot of the costumes were zombies, and they were coming out of nowhere. Suddenly, Michael Jackson's Thriller started playing as a flash mob of dancers gelled and started the famous dance of the Thriller video.

Gail was particularly elated, as she had been a performer in a similar event in Southern California about 8 years ago, and knew all the moves.

A portion of Thriller in Eugene

Squatting on a stool as if riding the old horse and being chased by The Headless Horseman.

Saturday night, we went back to the SMJ House for an incredible unabridged dramatic recitation of Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Oregon actor Alastair Morley Jacques.  This was about 90 minutes of rapid recitation totally from memory. Shoot, I have trouble remembering my own license plate.  It was quite a private performance, with only about 15 of us in the little foyer of the Victorian house.

Nick Visits!

Last Friday, I picked up Nick at the Eugene airport just in time for the 19th annual Yachats Mushroom Festival. He was with us until Tuesday, when we had to drive him back to Eugene. It was a mushroom themed visit - educational and fun!

Friday night was the Fun-Guys and Fun-Gals Feast. It was rather a low key affair with buffet servings from the local restaurants.  Saturday was our action packed day with two guided walks and perusing the mushroom exhibit at the Lion's Hall.

David Pilz, forest mycologist and author of the novel Bog Maiden, led us on our first tour. He pointed out various fungi and answered questions along the way. He even took a bite out of a big Russula to see if it was an edible species. Apparently it wasn't, as he spit it out forcefully.

We had a little time to kill, so we showed Nick the view from the top of Cape Perpetua.  Our walks were down below.

 Our next guided walk, a fast two hours, was with Susie Holmes, biology professor at Laine Community College.  She did an excellent job of being informative and humorous.


The couple on the left and their friend came all the way from Oklahoma, I believe, for this event.

Susie brought a collection of fungi from a hike she did the day before. It has been an unusually dry fall, so far, so she wasn't taking any chances.

This fungi is called an artist's conk, because if you scratch it, it turns a very dark color.  She demonstrated on this one.

 Off to the Lion's Club hall for tables of mushroom displays.  They were labeled by name and edibility.  There was a large table of unknown mushrooms.

A large bolete mushroom.


Sunday, Nick and I went hiking most of the day in the forest above the Carson Cemetery, a couple miles down the road.

 A corral mushroom.

 Amanita, muscaria, the psychoactive and toxic mushroom also known as Fly Agaric.

 A russula, possibly a shrimp russula, as it smelled like shrimp. We could even smell some of these before we saw them.

 We noticed this cluster of saprophytic mushrooms and upon going up a slope to examine them, we came upon a scattering of  chanterelles - a delicious musharoom that cannot be easily confused with other mushrooms.

Chanterelle mushroom.  We picked nearly a paper lunch bag full before stopping.

 This is the slope we found them on.

Another amanita with its tell-tale warts.

 When we got home, Gail had done some of her own mushroom hunting on our property.

 Nick brushed the chanterelles clean, and then sauteed a few. We decided to just eat a small amount each out of an abundance of caution to make sure none of us had a sensitivity to them.

We had the bug now! Monday, Nick and I headed for Cape Perpetua to do the Cummins Creek/Gwynn Creek loop trail. 

 After awhile, we just had to go up a slope to see if we culd find any more chanterelles. Bingo!  We collected another bag full.

 We had lunch on this overlook.

 By the time we made the loop, it was after 5:00 PM and the fog had rolled in .

Flipping over fungi.

The Gatherers

Gail made some amazing spore prints by covering upside down mushroom caps.  After a few hours or 24 hours, the spores fall from the gills leaving radiating patterns.  This is done usually to check the color of the spores for identification purposes.  Gail, though, is excited by the art possibilities.  More to come!

The Giving Tree

Our little apple tree next to the greenhouse had a bumper crop this fall. We picked quite a few apples before the animals caught on, but Monday night, while we were in Salem, it was like feeding time at the zoo.

First, it was our practically resident doe and her two fawns...

and then the mama bear and her two cubs...

who spent about seven hours going up and down the tree, eating apples, and doing what bears famously do in the woods - on our grass.

A couple videos showed "Mama Bear standing up and leaning on the plastic fabric of the greenhouse which thankfully didn't tear.  I was also thankful one of them didn't fall through the top of the greenhouse, as some of the branches extend over the top.

During daylight, the squirrels carried off apples to eat on our front porch or by the woodshed.

When the bears took a break, the raccoon ran in for its share, back and forth, apparently stashing the apples somewhere.

Last night we were able to discourage the bears from coming back by putting a radio in the greenhouse, tuned to a non-stop preacher, and a back lit oscillating fan for movement.

Today, we picked all remaining apples, pruned out the broken branches, and cleaned up the debris. The tree's bark has deep claw marks through its bark, also.  We'll be more ready next year now that we know what to expect.

Salem Trip

We spent two days in Salem, staying with friends Bob and Mary. I worked with Bob and Mary in the 70's and 80's in the Adolescent Treatment Program at Napa State Hospital. They moved to Oregon around 2000, and I hadn't seen them since, until this year.  On Monday, we all hiked through the very cool Riverfront Park and into the old part of the city. On Tuesday, we drove out to Silver Falls State Park with its spectacular and numerous waterfalls - several which you can actually walk behind. I should have brought a good camera as my pretty good cell phone locked me out and I didn't know my password. Gail's older cell phone at least filled in, but could not do the fall scenery justice.

 Here we are at the new pedestrian suspension bridge ("Taco Bridge") in Riverfront Park.

 Lifting this tree up for me to pass under.

 The water flow was pretty low, but spectacular anyway.

 When we started the hike, it was 40 degrees. When we finished, it was 79 - very warm for this time of year.

 Bob says a guy went over this waterfall years ago in a canoe and survived.