Tag: OrangeDoor

Leaving Summer Lake, Riddle Routes Bend

On the previous day, we left the Walker Trail Trailhead and headed to Lakeview for some lunch. We heard a squeal. It was intermittent, so at first we ignored it. Eventually we pulled over and had a look. But we know little about cars, so that wasn’t helpful. On we continued to Lakeview where we ate at a Chinese restaurant and headed back to our lodgings. Unfortunately, as we drove through town the squealing was super loud, so much so that people’s heads were turning. We pulled over and again looked at where we thought the source was, our front tire.

A man in a truck pulled over, immediately diagnosed the problem as a rock stuck in the wheel. He first crawled under the car to see if he could work the rock out that way. That didn’t work, so he asked us to pull the car up onto the curb and did another check. No rock. From there, he got a jack out of his truck and asked for our tire iron. That’s the level of car knowledge I have, so we could supply that. He took off the tire, but no dice. Back to the truck he went for more tools and he disassembled the breaks. It was at this point I did feel a prickle of worry that he might not be able to put things back together, but it was late afternoon on Sunday in a small town, so he was probably our best bet.

It turned out the rock was buried as deep as it could be in the workings of the tire. Our good Samaritan found it, reassembled everything, and was on his way. We compensated him for his time because when someone helps two city folk with no car knowledge in a small town, that is a very lucky thing.

We took the rock with us, and here Matt is modeling it for the camera.

So tiny, yet so loud! The rock then joined the other rocks in the driveway of our cabin.

On this day, it had rained all night and into the morning which wasn’t great for stargazing, but made for a cozy night playing board games in the cabin.

From there, we took the very long way to Bend taking Highway 395 past Lake Albert over to Highway 20. On Highway 20, driving became normal again, with much traffic. We stopped at Hampton Station for lunch and found it was overwhelmed with customers and almost out of food. Our sandwich choices were limited, but they were good.

In Bend, we did a Riddle Route and had fun exploring the city that way. I grabbed this picture of a very stripy couple walking while we were on our route.

The air quality in downtown Bend was hazy, but not terrible. But once we got to the north part of the city it was very smoky and then increasingly smoky on our drive to Sisters, where we checked into 5 Pine Lodge and shut ourselves in for the night.

Exploring Lake County

We took a drive to see if we could find the place where hang gliders launched. The dirt roads challenged our Honda Civic, and we ended up pulling over and Matt exploring the last bit by foot. We then looped back to a scenic lookout for a picture.

We then did a short hike on the Walker Trail, going nowhere near the 30 mile length of the trail, but appreciating the scenery.

I liked these dollops of bright red-orange against the greens and browns on the trail.

From there, we went to Lakeview for lunch. On the way, an intermittent screeching began. More on that tomorrow. In the meantime, here is another pretty view of our cabin. While the cabin is darling, we discovered that the screens weren’t tightly fit into the windows and it got a little buggy inside once the sun went down. I’ve set my sights on the Sunrise or Sunset cabins for our next visit.

We Escaped! From the Mysterious Museum

Some time ago, Matt brought home two escape room games. Exit has created at-home escape rooms, which are brilliant. For less than the cost of one person attending an escape room, one to four players can “escape” from the scenario. There’s also no having to work in teams with people you’ve never met before, a thing I don’t love about real escape rooms.

We worked through the various rooms and escaped from the museum.

At the end, you can fill out your certificate.

If you use the app, it keeps time for you, and then you can enter your information and get a star rating. We got 8 out of 10.

While card game “rooms” don’t provide some of the surprises we’ve found in physical escape rooms, this was a fun experience I would like to repeat.

Matt’s Birthday Celebration

As with many things, we dropped the ball on making reservations for Matt’s birthday celebration (the just-us dinner) and so the celebration happened almost a month after his birthday.

But Arden was worth the wait. We had the four-course prix fixe menu and I would swear that there were about seven courses in that four-course dinner.

The dinner ended with a Basque-style cheesecake and for Matt a little scoop of sorbet and a birthday candle to blow out.

Arden was a delightful place to eat.

Celebrating Matt’s Birthday at Emperor Georgiou’s Tea Room

Somewhat recently, Emperor Georgiou’s Tea Room, set up (tea) shop in Kenton. Matt decided to celebrate his birthday there so we could experience the tea.

Some pretty cups.

One of our platters of food. While no service job is easy, being a wait staff at a tea shop does have its advantages: a very limited menu; a set timeframe; the inability for people to become inebriated by consuming the product.

I grabbed a picture of Matt and his mom, Linda. I neglected to catch the rest of the table.

Two Good Choices I Made with Orange Door Landscaping

When we redid the side yard to feature native plants, I planted two bushes, one to the left of the door and one in the front bed. This is the first year they have really popped.

To the right of the door is Oceanspray (Holodiscus discolor) which has done a great job of growing in the shade of the flowering plum tree. It has also behaved by growing up more than out, giving us a bit of a screen in front of the porch. I have done a bit of pruning to keep it from shooting out to the sidewalk, but not very much. It’s a very vertical plant.

I was excited to plant Syringa or Lewis’s Mock Orange (Philadelphus lewisii) because it’s the Idaho state flower, and I’ve always like to say the word “Syringa.” It has also done a great job growing mostly upward, though it needs a little more pruning than the Oceanspray. And it tends to fall over, if not anchored to a stake. But it’s very pretty in general and I love the white flowers. The USDA fact sheet says Native Americans used it for arrow shafts, combs, bowls, cradles, and other things.

Here’s to success in landscaping, especially landscaping carried out by a person with few landscaping skills.

New Desk!

My desk is inundated with computer things. There isn’t a flat surface I can write on. I’ve been looking around for a folding desk that can appear when I need a non-computer desk surface, and I found a fun one.

This folding desk came from the Ukraine. It joined the working wall with my clothes dryers. In its folded state, it looks like this:

And then when I need it, it becomes this adjustable desk.

This allows me to roll back and forth between the computer desk and the folding desk. I could also make it a standing desk, if I so chose.

Milkshake and Craft at Creative Culture

I found out about Creative Culture from my friend. She posted a picture of the fanciest milkshake I had ever seen. The place to get that milkshake was Creative Culture, a DIY craft studio and milkshake bar.

It’s a pretty slick business model. Though we went for the milkshake, we stayed for a craft project.

We chose to do string art, which was one of their more economical offerings.

First, we pounded in all the nails, then discovered it was difficult to put the string on, so we removed the nails and went section by section.

Our finished art.

The thing that motivated us to visit.