Another Hike, A Couple Surprises

After homework, chores and a yummy coffee cake, we went on a hike today up at Angels Rest. It's getting so pretty around here. All kinds of new bright green flora and a healthy first little batch of fauna; bumble bees, butterflies, bunnies and more.

The first surprise of the day came in the form of a pile of creepy garter snakes. Ugh. No matter how well I know in my logical adult mind that these snakes are harmless, I always jump when I see them. And looking at the pictures gives me goosebumps and the inability to leave my feet on the ground. Go figure. You can view a couple of them below:

Reasons for why they were in a pile may possibley include a) sunning themselves and b)the event of a mating ball. Though they slithered off when we started taking pictures of them, by the time we hiked back down they were relocated.


Above is a little bunny rabbit who hopped across our path


From the top we could see several little sailboats taking advantage of the sunshine

There were also some vultures circling around nearby looking for booty

Our hike was ended with one more surprise. This one brought on by a human version of vultures, whose booty today happened to be our stereo. Ours was one of two cars with smashed windows. Documentation of our poor injured Volvo:

Such a bummer. We reported it to the police, and both they and other hikers we encountered informed us that this stuff-- people breaking into cars for stuff to hawk for drug money--is getting more and more common out I-84, along the Gorge. Ironically enough, the Oregonian published an article on the problem today.Too many travelors, not enough seeing eyes.

Sunday's Gig

As some of you may know, I (Carrie) have been playing gigs pretty regularly with another acoustic singer/songwriter, Tiffany Carlson. She's from Oregon City, and we do most of our gigs there (only 25 min from our house) since she already had her foot in the door in a couple places when I first moved up. Last weekend we played at a fun little pub called The Highland Stillhouse, where we play every third Sunday of the month. Here's some pictures from the night.

Tomorrow, (Thursday) we have a gig at a place called The Eastburn, at 9pm. Its a little more downtown Portland, and its shorter, so Jeremy is going to come too. (He doesn't usually hang out for the three hours most gigs are.) Also I've informed Kate that she and Phil and any Scappoosian gang that wants to come should... anyone else from around here who might happen to read my blog (Tanya Kangas or Jocelyn Little) should come too!

A Aviatory Experience

A week ago today, Jeremy woke up with a cold. A couple days later I came down with it. Needless to say, last school week was extremely trying. Many rolls of toilet paper, bowls of chicken noodle soup, cups of soothing tea, and packets of saltine crackers later, today I woke up without a sore throat and a headache, and though we both have the sniffles/cough/unfortunate need to spew revolting matter from our mouths, we drove out to the air museum near McMinville to do a little post-illness adventuring.

The air museum is called the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum. Unfortunately the Space part is under construction and won't be open until June, but we still had fun looking at the "air" display, looking at all the airplanes and helicopters outside, and wandering around the IMAX building, which shows 3-D movies (that we didn't view) and currently has the micminville school district science competitions displayed, which were super cute and fun to look at. Here are some of the pictures we took while we were there:

Sitting pretty, first class...

A fighter Plane: P-38 used in the "Pacific Theatre"

A Custom plane with a cute little face. Aw.

A WWI German Tri-Plane

A P-51 Fighter plane: Used during WWII

A Now-a-day Stunt Plane

A B-27, WWII: Used in the Dolittle Raid


The Spruce Goose: The Plane for which it was all made. Its wings span is longer than a foot-ball field, and it's the biggest plane made out of wood: birch.

Jeremy says this is an Infantry helmet.... why its in the air museum??

Some kind of American trainer plane

A Vietnam Bomber... (or training plane)

Careful...

"The Strutting Peacock"

"I just have to finish blow-drying my hair..."

Jeremy gives you his best Roger O. Thomhill, of North by Northwest

And that my friends, concludes this days happenings. Thanks to Jeremy for letting us in on the names and many happy uses of the above mentioned aero-planes. I'm going to go make some tea.

And we're back...

Above: a pretty little trail we found Sunday

Here we are at the end of our first weekend of the final term of our first year at PSU. Three cheers for firsts and lasts. I found out last week that my Spring classes are going to require a lot of rather involved homework assignments, so even with Fridays off, weekends are going to be rather work-intensive. However, thanks to Jeremy, I'm sure i won't spend the whole time indoors slaving away. This weekend we went hiking in the gorge not once, but twice, and he's already got a backpacking trip planned for next weekend. With no further a-do, I give you this weekends sights and scenes.

Above: a wee field mouse we spotted out trotting about in the sunshine.
(Yes, of course Jeremy tried to catch it.)

Above: A waterfall (Horsetail falls... we finally found it...) for which to walk behind

Above: A Choo choo.

Above: A chopper. Jeremy's dad, Craig used to fly one of these on Navy search and rescue missions. We saw three!


Above: A pretty little spring flower. Jeremy told me, but I forgot the name.

Above: a raging river careening down to the gorge (quite a lot of snow melt)

And that concludes the sampling our this weekends adventures... and now, sense it's actually Monday and I am just now posting this, back to the grind.