west coast trip [no. 2]: bend & ashland

Leaving Portland, we drove down past Mt. Hood and through the Warm Springs reservation, home of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, to the city of Bend in central Oregon.

In 1984 my maternal grandparents retired to Bend, where we visited them throughout my childhood. This past May, my grandmother passed away there, and Tumelo Creek in the photograph above is where my grandfather, mother, and aunt, scattered her ashes.

We also visited the public library where my grandma volunteered for many years. She was responsible for selecting and mailing books to far-flung readers who were unable to visit the library in person very often (or at all). In ranching territory, this was not an insignificant group of people! She developed correspondence relationships with many of them, and was particularly proud of her ability to introduce her readers to new authors, occasionally sneaking in something they professed disinterest for. I remember one man, particularly, who refused to read women authors -- until my grandmother got him hooked on the mystery writer P.D. James!

We stayed at the hotel we nearly always stayed in when I was a child, but to which I hadn't been in over a decade: The Bend Riverside Inn & Suites. My mother had given us some money from her inheritance from my grandmother so we splurged on two nights in literally riverside accommodation on the Deschutes.

We ate well, lunching with my grandpa at the Victorian Cafe and discovering a coffee favorite of the trip, thump coffee.

thump had wooden shingles for customers to draw on, which they then hung up in the rafters -- great decor! Hanna and I each contributed one to the collection.

We left Bend after a two-night stay and drove south to Ashland. Hanna had never been to Crater Lake, so we took a detour and drove through the park. It was incredibly foggy, but there were still amazing views!

The incoming clouds, portending fog at higher elevations.

Ashland -- as long-time readers of this blog may remember -- is the town near where the Oregon Extension program is located (about which I wrote my thesis). We actually stayed at the Greensprings Inn, twenty miles up in the mountains.

It was gloriously dark and quiet. We would have stayed longer, but we had a wedding to attend!

The next morning we had breakfast at the Greenleaf and merged back onto the I-5.

Mt. Shasta from the road...