2018.4.1. The Thanksgiving Play

4/1. Sunday. Rain. The Thanksgiving Play by By Larissa FastHorse at the Artist Rep. I didn't like this satire, even though well acted, and some fun dialogues. Overall, I found this play silly.

2018.3.31. Maxwell Butte snowshoe

3/31, Saturday. Priyanka picked me up at 6:30am, to meet the others at Tualatin P&R at 7am. 7 women + 2 dogs drove to Maxwell Butte Sno-Park, on Santium Hwy, north of the junction of hwy-22 and hwy-20. Forecast for the day is partly sunny. Blue sky when we reached the large parking lot with only 3 other cars and an outhouse (2 stalls, no TP).

The first ~half mile is a road, ok to walk in boots, occasionally sank. But snowshoe is much easier. The first junction has a sign. Blue diamonds on tree. 2nd is a 4-way junction and a map showing that we are at the east end of the map at Mark 5. Quite many loop trails you can do here that's shown on that map. We continue straight and out of the map. You definitely want snowshoes now. A mile or so later, another junction, signed. We met a lady here with a full pack. Turn right here. At this point, we have already entered Mt. Jefferson Wilderness. Next is a small lake. No snow on tree branches. So far, the grade is very gentle. No more footprint.

A few of the ladies downloaded GPS maps, so we knew where about we were going. But there's no marking, no sign of any trail. Just snow, quite soft. After skirting to the east, where the slope is not as steep, we picked our way up. Gets quite steep, but good view. We decided to turn around just few steps shy of the end of this ridge. It's steep enough that rocks poke out of snow, so hard to walk on snowshoes. I picked my way up grabbing on branches, until I could poke my head above. The top is still further, but gentler. Too wooded to see any view. So came back down and had lunch with the group. Nice view, but too cloudy. Jefferson is completely covered. On a clear day, Three-Finger Jack is very close by, and 3 Sisters should be clearly visible.

Some of us removed snowshoes getting down this steep slope, but I found it easier with snowshoes (except above where we lunched), as the snow was reasonably deep and soft to support our weight. Lisa and I were the fastest coming down, and both of us had snowshoes on.

Back to P&R before 6pm. Sunny and warm in Portland! Total about 9 miles. 2100'?

2018.3.29. Luis Alberto Urrea at Powell's Books

3/29, Thursday. Urrea on his book tour of House of Broken Angels. He's funny and entertaining, and a great reader. His theatre major in his college years certainly helps. He said he reads all his audio books. The room was full.

2018.3.26. Weldon Wagon Trail - early spring flower

3/26, Sunday, a bit better weather than Saturday. I picked up Mary, my go-to botanist, at 8am, and we headed to a flower hunt. In the Hiking eNews from Friends of The Gorge on Thursday, it said "Columbia desert parsley (pictured) is in peak bloom right now along the Weldon Wagon trail". This is the impetus of today's outing.

The TH is off east of the Husum (4 miles north of White Salmon). ~1 mile of good condition gravel road. There's a clearing on the left for parking, and a gate to the right. The only indication that this may be the entrance is the boot-brush. Mary climbed over the gate, and I went over the ditch on the side of the gate. There, is the short 4x4 road to the real TH, to your right, up the hill into the woods. It looks quite nice. Very gentle grade, slowly going up. Once emerged from the woods, it's a long open slope, with nice views to the town of Husum and beyond. We found hound's tongue, oak's toothwort, quite some buttercup, grass widow, a low lying lomatium with no smell, a couple of violet. Balsomroot started blooming under last year's dead leaves. Only one small section has the purple Lomatium Columbianum. They are small and not yet full bloom. Nice large oak grove here.

The trail continues up into woods again, and skirting by some private residences. The last piece is a tree farm, the only one doesn't have a no-trespassing sign. Right after this is the eastern TH by a large gravel road. Some abandoned farm equipment.

One odd thing of this trail today is that the first 1/3 is much warmer (maybe because it's lower, but not by much). I could feel the sudden temperature change.

We encountered less than 10 people and a few dogs. We were the first car there. Total about 5 miles, 1300'.

I insisted not to have lunch yet, but wait till Catherine Creek. Drove pass the town of White Salmon, it looks quite nice. We had lunch on a bench with this view to the right.

After lunch, we hiked up north over some boot path and bike trails. Better Columbia Parsley here, as well as the pungent parsley. Saw some grass widow, upland larkspur, lots of saxifrage, blue-eyed mary, miniature phlox, miniature monkey flower, broomrape, popcorn, spearleaf agoseris, shooting start, lots of yellow bell, golden star, and filaree, a little bit fairy star and small common camas.

View of the Columbia River from here is always lovely. Weather improved. About 2 miles here. Back in town around 5pm.

2018.3.24. Trillium Lake snowshoe

3/24, Saturday, partly cloudy -> rain/snow. 6 of us and a dog drove met at Gateway at 7:30am, and drove to Trillium Lake Sno-Par for Trillium Lake. Sun shone through clouds in, and heavy new snow on green trees. Very pretty. Last week has been cold and wet.

Obnly 7-8 cars (including ours) in the big parking lot. The wide snow trail starts behind the closed gate, yes, it starts on the road. At the junction, we turn left for a clock-wise loop, 3 on snowshoes and 3 on cross-country skis. Fluffy snow. It's easy to slow down a bit, just walk in the new snow. No wind, I even worked up some sweat. I took all the outer layers off. Snow cascaded off top branches, sparkling in the sun.

Mt Hood looked regal from here. Even though it was only 10:20, we decided to have our lunch break here. I like this "PEED" sign, the rest of the "SPEED LIMIT" letters were buried in the snow. The lake looks pristine, non one walked into the lake much. Last 2 weeks were too warm, probably not safe. You can walk around the lake. But we followed the main route, and soon left the view of the lake, as well as Hood.

The clouds got thicker, and the temperature dropped. I put on a fleece. Mostly we were on some road (of course the road was under the snow) with limited view, so no much snow that fell from the tree would land on us. At Summit Prairie, view expands. The "Oregon Trail" sign says An original gathering place for Native American Indians, in 1866 squatter Perry Vickers built the first log cabin here which became another tollgate. By 1905 a large wooden structure known as Summit House, a cedar shake tipi, a barn and corral occupied this clearing. Soon, we were back at the junction, and a lot more people. It started to snow lightly. But much less snow on the trees, not as pretty.

Overall, maybe 4.5 miles, ~500'. Back in town ~2pm. I got dropped off at home, nice. Rained the rest of the day.