Category: Travel

Preface: I’ve been to all 48 contiguous states. I have been to nearly all multiple times. I plan on going to Alaska next year. Hawaii might be harder. – For me, I’m going to have to say it’s a toss-up between Kansas and Oklahoma. The landscapes are long in the face and don’t seem loved [...]

Today was one of knowledge, seeing and experience: the kind of day I hold as the highest value in my esteem. We are staying in the Hotel Condon, built in 1920 and recently restored–carefully, tastefully. There is a pervasive obsession with the Rat Pack here. Most of the time the public areas are bathed with [...]

Yesterday’s drive into Condon, was during the long-shadow part of the day in the dryland wheat farming hills of north central Oregon. Wind farms have been expanding ferociously in this corridor, and ones of truly epic proportion are clustered in the dozens, hundreds in total. Here is a quick, 20-second clip of the beautiful shadows [...]

Mr. Pencil and I are heading out this afternoon on a weekend trip typical of us: a rambling, informal Oregon-exploratory thing that usually leaves us dusty and informed. We’re headed to Condon, a small and mostly forgotten town in the midst of the Oregon wheat hill country. That is to say: about 2.5 hours east [...]

I kind of forgot to mention that right before my surgery we spent the weekend in Sunriver and Bend, Ore. I suppose I had other things on my mind. One of the memorable things was the gorgeous-day strenuous hike up Smith Rock (near Terrbonne, Ore.). Autumn was with us and did put up some photos [...]

Segways on Pismo Beach Originally uploaded by lyzadanger We went “gliding,” as my father-in-law would say. The big all-terrain tires made it more off-roady as we glided over the sand. The photo is on the pier in Pismo Beach. It was sunny but pretty darned cold.

I was reminded of a few of the Things I Hate The Most on my queasy way back from Salem tonight. I am still not back to a health point where I feel awesome about venturing out of my house, but I had a midterm for my viticulture class that was non-optional, so again the [...]

Long weekend to celebrate my Dad’s birthday in the Okanagan Valley, here we come! So phenomenally busy, I can hardly even express it. This will be a chance to talk about relaxing under the specter of all of the things I’m not getting done. Time to read a novel poolside under the guise of a [...]

Mr. Pencil and I spent a long weekend in Ashland, Oregon, to pre-celebrate our second anniversary. We have a wedding the weekend of our true one (this coming weekend), so had to adjust. We did the usual Pencil activities. Lush dining: Amuse in downtown Ashland served up a fire-grilled extra-rare pork chop that Mr. Pencil [...]

In college I wrote a paper on historical place naming in the United States (and read a book on it). Here are some town names I saw on my trip: What CheerSpinkOak OpeningsRavineNo NameBig Otter