2017.3.26. Columbia Gorge in rain

3/26, Sunday, non-stop rain/drizzle. Late start. Visited Reeds College campus. Cherry trees are blooming nicely.

Went to Multnomah Falls Lodge for lunch. Turns out it is brunch only. $25/pp. Food is okay. I like the 2 salads they have. The sweets are too sweet. Salmon is overcooked. Decent variety. The good thing is that we could see a bit of the falls beyond the window. We were also happy to be dry for awhile.

Visited Herman and his fellow sturgeon at Bonneville Dam Fish Hatchery. Herman was lying there all along. This guy was circling the pond. He's almost as big as Herman. Too rainy to continue exploring.

It turned out I had to drive another 50 minutes each way to fetch a scarf we forgot at the restaurant yesterday. So, it was good to go home earlier.

2017.3.25. Drift Creek Falls + Cascade Head

3/18. The forecast for today is okay. I picked up a car in the morning, and 3 of us drove towards the coast.

First stop is the city park of Dayton to see this blockhouse, moved here from Grand Ronde where it served as a military post of an Indian Agency 150 years ago. I found this and the next site in a series of books of Road Less Traveled in Oregon.

Erratic Rocks State Recreation Area is a 5-10 minute walk up a gentle hill among private properties, lined with white cherry trees. A small site, a couple of big boulders piled together, possibly deposited here by last glacier flood. The view of surrounding area is quite nice, especially in spring: everything is green.

Drift Creek Falls is a short easy hike: 3 miles RT, 500' loss and gain, made difficult now due to mud. A 10+ mile gravel road. So slow coming and going. The hike itself is boring, but what awaits at the end is a worthwhile reward, or 2 rewards: a long hanging bridge (very solid, and not swing much), from where you can see the waterfall plunge down the canyon below.

My 3rd time to Cascade Head, one of my favorite coastal hikes. It's as muddy as last time (in spring). I didn't go up the hill this time. Instead, went over the fence and walked to the tip of the head. Very pretty.

On the way back, had dinner at Delaney Madison Grill just north of Salem, overlooking the small Staats Lake. Quite pretty. Food is good, service is slow but otherwise great.

2017.3.19. Snowshoe Timberline Lodge to end of Palmer Lift

3/19, a rare sunny Sunday. Mountains in the lower 48 always look prettier in winter and spring. Mt Hood today looks pristine.

4 of us met at Clackamas Town Center TC at 9:20, a pleasant start time (still, I got on my train at 7:30am). I was late because Samrock Run caused my transfer to be late. Hwy26 wasn't icy, and passenger cars can probably make it. However, there was a slow line at the turn of Timberline Hwy. There was guy talking to each driver, and turning cars away, because the parking lot at the lodge was full. No surprise. Linda (our organizer) told him that we were going to Tyee Lodge, as there was an event this weekend at Tyee. Luckily, the 2nd checkpoint was at Mazama Lodge, before Tyee. We drove pass that without problem, and up to Timberline. This stretch should benefit having a 4WD. As luck had it, again, we found a parking spot right away. Cars here are parked with a lot of space between them, a waste of real estate.

There's a snowshoe track, groomed by a big snowcat all day long. I walked to its right, so I don't have to see the man made track, and got to see some rocks and tiny plants. It was so warm that I stripped down to just base layer, and took my rain pants off. The surface of the snow was glistening, melting and refreezing. A bit icy at places. Sounded crunchy. The crust wasn't thick, so crampons and snowshoes can bite into the surface. Once at the Palmer base, I had to put another layer on. When I sat above the end of Palmer Lift, I had to put on all my clothes (a down sweater and a rain jacket, a wind breaker hat), even though there was no wind nor rain. I asked some lady sitting here where Silcox Hut was, because that was our goal. Only when she responded that I had passed it awhile ago and it was buried in the snow, I realized that I know her, as well as 2 of her 3 companions! More thin clouds were forming, shading the sun a bit. At 8400', it is only 2.5 miles from the parking lot, and you can see it all the way up. Of course, you can also see Jefferson and 3 Sisters in the distance, a few lakes in the woods all frozen. When my group arrived, I left my pack with them, and walked up a bit, as the slope isn't steep at all. But when I tried to take a photo (this one to the right with lots of people sitting down), my pole fell, and it didn't stop for a couple of minute. Not something I wanted to see, so I returned. Yes, you can see people climbing on higher slopes.

Going down is fast. I tried to glisade, but all the people and their track, as well as the gentle slope made is quite difficult to get the momentum going. I went to its south side again, and slid down on the icier slope. However, my rain pants got a big cut.

2016.3.11-12 Langley on Whidbey Island

3/11, Saturday, rain tapering off. Took the Mukilteo-Clinton ferry in the afternoon. Short crossing: less than 20 minutes. Some blue sky just above water, thick dark clouds all around. Drove south to check out Cultus Bay before settled in Langley.

The goal tonight is the dinner at Inn at Langley, choreographed by chef Matt Costello. It's a feast for the eyes: food, plates, as well as utensils. Very creative and pretty. Portions are very small: all bite size. I was still hungry before eating two servings of every desert course. Definitely a treat, and definitely overpriced. Meal $155, drink separate (1 white, 1 red, 1 desert wine set for $55, or 5 wine flight for $95) but each pour barely covered the bottom of the wine glass. The wines are retailed for about $15/bottle if purchased from stores. So adding ~10% tax + 20% tip, you are looking at a $200-$300 expense.

Dinner starts with a set of cocktail, all in minute quantities. From left to right in the photo: a) gin & tonic bubble + lemon water in a spoon; 2) kumquat cup of whisky topped with a dried cherry on a pedestal; 3) mojito flavored sugar stalk in a glass; 4) coconut ball with vodka topped with a coffee bean (our favorite) on a pedestal; 5) a bloodymary leaf in a small but heavy steel paper holder. All 5 came in a rectangular plate. This took forever to assemble. But it's fun to watch the team do it.

Salad is poached peas with pea leaves, and a jell made of water used to poach the pea, topped with some dark caviar. Very pretty. I like the jell. The pea and the leaves both lost the fresh pea taste. The caviar tastes bland. It comes in a plate that looks like a flying saucer. What's in the photo is just the middle 1/4 of the plate.

Bread doesn't come on the side, instead as two meal courses. First bread course is a warm molasses brioche with house made butter and a slice of taleggio cheese. This comes in an oval dark plate, with a gold colored spoon.

Steelhead cooked sous vide, grapefruit sauce, shaved Belgium endive, topped with salmon roes, sprinkled with dill and burrata cheese. This comes in a frisbee like thin plate, which looks a bit flimsy. This is my favorite course for the taste. The salmon is really tender. The cheese doesn't have much taste.

Second bread course is a biscuit topped with caramelized bacon fat with marionberry jam and aerated bacon fat. This comes in a square plate and silver colored knife. I like the bacon fat top. However, would prefer a regular rustic country bread without the trims, to both sweet bread courses.

Finally I saw the chef fired up the stove, and heated up a pan. He was frying morel and divided up among two dozen dark gray earthware. A pressure cook release some not-so-nice smell: asparagus. This turns out another my favorite dish of the night (however, I'd be happy to go without the asparagus): a piece of quail breast, morel, white asparagus, sprinkled with dried curry leaf. Don't know how the quail meat was cooked, it was excellent: tender, but cooked through. I also like the lemon-flavored drops and the toasted leaves used for decoration.

One cube of braised lamb, wild onion, a sheet of dried onion juice, porcini, sprinkled scallion. The onion juice is pressed between bamboo sheets. The sheets were broken to pieces and each goes to a plate.
It's amazing that the entire meal doesn't involve any last minute cooking, other than twice, mushroom was pan fried in a single pan. Except for the asparagus, no smell in the dining hall. This meal can be enjoyed without a nose.

Now desert: rhubarb and primrose juice in a glass, floated a tiny piece of fresh cheese, and sprinkled with wheat grass. Very pretty and I like the taste. Next, a glass ball is cut off from the ceiling, inside you find a velvet cake, crumbled hazelnuts, chocolate. My favorite is the baby food glass bottle, inside is butter scotch pudding, crumbled cracker, whipped chocolate frozen by liquid nitrogen, violet beads. The chocolate has an interesting waffle-like texture. Tea and coffee is now served.

I get to take the menu home, which has my name printed on it.

3/12, Sunday. Cloudy with occasional rain. Daylight saving started today. 11am, we joined about 20 others on a grey whale watching cruise with Mystic Sea out of the small Langley port named Sandy Point. Took a Dramamine pill before I board, anticipating rough water once we are out of the Sound. Instead, the boat only went to Port Susan, just between Camano Island and the mainland. We saw two whales. Multiple times, but each lasted a few seconds only. Still quite fun. Apparently these whales are the front troupers of a pod of 12 who like to go into the sound and dig shrimps in shallow water. So if you have a house by the water, you'd see them. Out of many groups that migrate north along this part of the shoreline, only this group comes in. The two we saw are #49 and #56. Today, there were another whale watching boat and two fishing boats stalking these two whales. Along the way, we also saw 4 bald eagles, a couple of seals.

At Double Bluff beach, dug some clams. It was rainy. I'm surprised to find quite a few people and dogs here.

At South Whidbey State Park, saw 4 other cars, but one person. There's a trail down to the beach, closed due to land slide. Walked there anyway, to a narrow beach. Good view of Olympic Mountains.

Fort Casey State Park is my favorite park on Whidbey Island. Right by the Coupeville - Port Townsend ferry. In the 1890s, Fort Casey, in union with Fort Worden (north of Port Townsend) and Fort Flagler (north tip of Marrowstone Island), comprised a triangle of fire guarding the entrance to Puget Sound. The lighthouse dated earlier. Now you can walk to the top of the new lighthouse (without the light). The cannons can move up and down, so to hide from the incoming ships, being on a bluff. However, with the invention of planes in the early 1900s, you can hide no more. The shells weight ~200-300Kg. It took a crew of over 20 people to operate a single cannon. I like the sweeping view and the grassy ground. On a clear day, you could see Rainier, and all the Olympic Mountains. Today, some Olympic peaks were visible.

Before heading back to the mainland, we hiked the short summit at Deception Pass, for sunset. Too many dark clouds. Going to rain the next day. Along hwy-20 saw many trumpet swans and snow geese. It's an amazing sight, at least a couple of thousand in one field, especially when they took off at the same time.

2017.3.5. Death Cafe

3/5, Sunday 2pm. I wanted to find something else to go to downtown for, as I was contemplating attending an author event at Powell's in the evening (about mushroom). Was intrigued by the title, completely unaware that Death Cafe has been going on for a few years and in many parts of the world.

I was late, as usual. The hostess lead me to a random table with a vacant chair. One side of room has coffee and tea, some sweets. I was surprised see so many people, spread over a dozen tables, ranging from 4 to 8 each. Most attendees are old, but a few are my age or younger. Each table has a facilitator, who's done these events many times. They have a sheet of questions to address if no organic conversation is going. My table has 6 people, only 1 man. His wife, also present, had a near death experience 39 years ago, which she only briefly mentioned. Our facilitator is in her mid 70's, very open, with a hearty laughter. She worked as a midwife, as well as care taker in hospice for many years. She told a lot of stories, and shared some some books (Being Mortal, The Good Death), movie How to Die in Oregon and information for Oregon, like POLST, voluntary stop eating and drinking and other info, as on WA state website. Of course some are on its website.

At 3pm, we were told to change table if we wish. No one at my table moved. I really enjoyed this event, more so than the book talk later on.

2017.3.4. Open Data Day

3/4 Saturday, a world-wide Open Data Day. In Portland, this event is hosted at OHSU. The following is copied from the event description:

Open Data Day is a gathering of citizens in cities around the world to write applications, liberate data, create visualizations and publish analyses using open public data to show support for and encourage the adoption of open data policies by the world's local, regional and national governments. In addition to general open data projects, Open Data Day Portland is co-organized with Data Rescue Portland and will be focusing on contributing to backup efforts for DataRefuge as well as Data.gov.

A couple of dozen people showed up for this day-long event. We are partitioned into two groups: 1) add or complete meta data for any data source to aid computer search 2) scrape data online and output simple description - data mapping, instead of nested links, to facilitate automatic search. There was a talk yesterday on using Python to scrape html, which I didn't attend. Today, there's an R version. So I decided to use R to look at NASA's ocean data. I didn't get very far, being the first time using R. If later, I have time to work on it, will post my result in my github and link it to PDX's Data Rescue's team github, following this guide line.

2017.3.3. Bronte - a play

3/3, Friday evening, Bag and Baggage started its new production of Bronte today. Due to the sale of Venetian Theatre, this is shown in Hillsboro Main Library. I really enjoyed this play by Polly Teale. However, I'm not sure if I like the venue, and the so-called promenade performance: during the course of the play, we were moved at least 4 times, 2 had seating. Not a lot of people today, so the seating was enough. I cannot imagine more than 50 people. I very much like the actors and the story. I ended up reading wikipedia on all the personage in the play on my way home. It's a 2 mile walk.