Oregon - Portland, Eugene, Lost Valley IC - 9/27-10/6/10

Oregon is awesome. We have been enjoying the tail end of the sunnier months here, before the overcast rainy season starts and goes until June.  I can understand why locals deal with less sun, when the tradeoff is lush magical rain forest, fertile valleys, and abundant waterways.

We started out our journey in Oregon in the cities of Portland and Eugene.  We were immediately impressed with the great public transportation, bicycle use/paths and bike-friendliness, and other awareness of sustainable practices.  We stayed with friends we met through our culture network that we met in Seattle the first weekend of our  arrival in the northwest.

It was great to hang out with Ross and Joanna in Portland and to check out some of the funkier artsier neighborhoods as well as the beautiful oriental gardens. Coming from Orcas Island, the high city energy was a bit much for us, and we gravitated toward hanging out in the beautiful Japanese garden on our arrival.

The gardens were extensive, peaceful, and very zen. Again, we were impressed with the city’s attention to green space and good energy. We got a great view of Mt. Hood!

Dining in Portland is fantastic, and we got entertained along the way with some creative art, including a decorated vehicle on Mississippi Avenue.

Our second day, after orienting ourselves to the city and doing some needed errands, we gravitated toward the Chinese garden. It was like walking through paintings, the place was exquisitely and authentically designed to be a piece of art. We also enjoyed a traditional and timeless (i.e. long and relaxed) tea ceremony, sampling different teas from China.

 

 

 

We visited the Baghadad cinema, where they filmed “What the Bleep, Down the Rabbit Hole” (above).

In Portland we visited the intentional community of Tryon, a permaculture education center with a sweet children’s school and some agile goats and friendly bees.

Oregon is home to creative building of small structures, such as the icosa hut (icosahedrons – 10-sided domes) that can be raised easily and inexpensively for singles and families.

Maitreya intentonal community, Eugene

We moved on to Eugene, where we stayed with our friends Bodhi and Cordy in their home that invites healing workshops. It reminded us of our home in Ipswich, only bigger and older (classic Eugene). Bodhi gave us some great tours of the university and the surrounding areas. We visited the intentional communities of Maitreya, Hearticulture, and Maya’s small community with icosa huts.  We shared pancake breakfast and music jams with Reba and other friends at Hearticulture and made friends with the pigs.

Our Eugene friend Bodhi

Our Eugene friend Tara at her husband David's restaurant - great food and great nusicians!

We attended an art walk where we got to see some great galleries and Kule’s friend from 30+ yrs ago Sufi Abode community, Tara, and her husband David play in their Accordions Anonymous band (video below). They also have a folk band called Red Pajamas where they perform their own compositions. We enjoyed our music and dining connections with them!

We also enjoyed the great street food and awesome young street musicians; my son Jason would have enjoyed meeting these creative young people.  The Saturday market is the biggest and best organic produce and creative crafts market I’ve ever experienced; it was a joy to taste the food and hear the highly talented street musicians (including a young man playing the marimba like Jason used to do).

We got a chance, finally, in nearby quaint and hip town of Corvallis to meet Lawrence Cole (associated with new culture and the Port Townsend Ecovillage) who does a wonderful song concert, where participants weave in and out, connecting with each other on the floor singing different parts.  We thought of our friend Michael O'leary in Gloucester, MA leading wonderful songs.

We could see living in Eugene with the comfortable-size city, creativity, sustainability awareness, and cool friendly people. It’s a town of young and old hippies and “cultural creatives”, and we felt right at home.

Lost Valley Permaculture Educational Center

Lost Valley Madrone Trail

It was hard to leave our friends in Eugene, and it made it easier to move into Lost Valley, where we stayed with our friend Melanie, who we met through Bodhi. Melanie is working on bringing more spiritual community to Lost Valley, and she invited us to offer a Non-Violent Communication (NVC) mini-workshop (by Kule), a Zegg Forum demonstration, and a sound healing circle. The facilities at Lost Valley are wonderful, and the land is magical. I wrote about a spiritual connection I had there on my other blog www.jasonmichellefoster.blogspot.com

We got tours of the gardens, the trails, the creek and swimming hole, and the educational and lodging facilities at Lost Valley. We also sat in on one of their regular community meetings, a sacred circle with a forum for open communication. We plan to return to Lost Valley in Nov-Dec to spend more time on this precious land, practice being in community and sharing our gifts with them, and learning more about permaculture.

Orcas Island, Washington - Magic and Music, 9/20-26/10

Our time has been full of blessings; we are finally getting to post our Orcas photos, and Portland and Eugene are next, along with our current journey at the intentional community of Lost River Valley, Oregon.

Sunset from Turtleback Mountain, Orcas Island

Orcas Island is magical. Surrounded by water, it has mountain and lake energy as well as expansive skies and beautiful sunsets. The island charm is enhanced by the alternative sustainability-minded locals. This place isout of the Bambi video, visited by so many deer and rabbits, along with local herd of sheep and adorable alpaca.

We met the mystical water creatures that are the namesake of this island - we were Orca-abundant that day, with 3 pods and probably 90 orca around our boat

This is a place that inspires creativity and music. Hanging with Ben, Samara, Noah and their friends would of course inspire this. It was a joy to be playing music with Ben again at the open-mike in hippy-spa Doe Bay after a soothing hot tub and refreshing (friggin freezin) dip in the ocean. We introduced the audience to the water phone and met the daughter of the guy who invented it to call whales! We of course had an awesome powerful sound healing circle. When our homebound ferry was filled up, the 3 hour wait for the next one became a great opportunity to do more music on the dock, with an audience that included a professional photographer we had met the day before at Mt. Constitution.

View of Mt Baker from Mt Constitution, Orcas Island

We had a blast staying at Ben's and Noah's home in the woods and then Samara's in town, eating great home cooking, getting silly, reminiscing old times with Jason (a bit of sadness but joyful  energy), hanging with wild fun island artists and musicians, and being in community with loving friends. We enjoyed a magical sunset kayak with the colorful starfish and wise cliff rocks. The Saturday market was an awesome community gathering with great food, conversation, and cultural sharings.

Our friends want us to move to Orcas, and that is enticing. It was hard to leave the peaceful island to get back to the busier mainland, and are enjoying further exploration of the northwest and sustainable community.

We had a short visit in Port Townsend and enjoyed the tour of the Port Townsend Ecovillage; a sweet small farm that has a few plots of land left. Lawrence Cole, a songweaver who we finally got to meet in Corvallis near Eugene a week later, is associated with Port Townsend.



Port Townsend Ecovillage


We are continuing our exploration of ecovillages in the Eugene, Oregon area and Lost Valley permaculture educational center. Loving the energy here!

Seattle,Olympic Peninsula 9/9-19/10

We are on the west coast! We touched the Pacific in beautiful Ruby beach in the Olympic Peninsula and danced a celebration of our coast-to-coast journey. We first arrived in the Seattle area to visit Kule's brother Joel , his wife Karen and their son Gary. We've thoroughly enjoyed our time with them, touring the city, eating great food, and being in the beautiful nature surrounding Seattle, including Snoqualmie Falls and the Washington Lake locks and salmon ladders.

The Pacific Northwest is magical........very wet, but magical! Camping in the rain was a joy in this lush rainforest. Kule got to use his Finnish hand grenade cooker, and we feasted and had an adventure making our way in th dark to a cold bath in the lake over slippery driftwood logs.

This is the land of the Quinault Indian Nation, th land of the giant trees - the Douglas fir, the cedar, the Sitka. We camped next to a sacred Sitka tree, and visited the largest Sitka in the world, a wise 1000 yr. old grandmother tree.

We met the goddess of the giant cedar. Even the fallen trees, laden with moss and bare root, are beautiful homes to the wildlife, including the great gray slug.

Before we left the Peninsula we got to see the salmon jumping in the cascades (see video below) , and we soaked ourselves in the soothing Sol Duc Hotsprings.

The forest was enchanted, and so were we.

We visited two intentional communties on the way to Orcas Island (where we are now visiting our dear friends Ben, Noah, and Samara). One was in Olympia, a funky old town with a great country marketplace full of hand-made goods - I got a wooden bowl made with love by Larry! The co-housing in Olympia called Woodard Lane is shown below; it's new, and in a very nice wooded location in the city (nature is so close to cities here!)  The houses are beautiful, and more expensive than I would have imagined (although not as pricey as Ipswich). We also visited the Port Townsend Ecovillage in another great city spot with organic farmland. The co-founder of that IC, Kees, studied with the co-founder of Earthhaven (Diana Christian). Everyone's learning from each other how to set up the legal structures to code; it's inspiring.
We'll visit more ICs in Washington and Oregon for sure. We could see living in the area, but not ready to make any decisions yet; still got the travel bug!

Yellowstone and Grand Teton - Wyoming, Idaho, Montana - 9/4-7/10

Yellowstone/GrandTeton – Wyoming, Idaho, Montana – 9/4-7/10


Magnificence and awe.

Tears welcomed me to Yellowstone. Tears of gratitude that we can experience this expanse of untouched land and wildlife, with natural wonders. Our first grand vista was Tower Falls, just past our rustic cabin at Roosevelt Lodge. (We received a warm free-chocolate birthday cake welcome at the lodge on our arrival at 10 PM the night before!)

The weather changes are as wild as the landscape. We could barely stay standing on Mt. Washburn!

It’s clear how Artist Point got its name at Canyon. The Falls are spectacular, and the colors of the cliffs add to the splendor. Sitting atop at Upper Falls and feeling the power of the water reminded me of my visit to Iguazu Falls with Jason and my sister Mariana 4 years ago; I feel Jason’s presence so strongly at times like this.

We got a respite from the crowds sitting (carefully) on top of a landslide cliff, the perfect meditation spot.

And yes, we did spot a grizzly. And yes, we were in the car along with a traffic jam, all trying to get a camera shot of the cute “little” bear. I guess we were one of the lucky ones!

We also saw several bison, elk, bald eagle, osprey, and some large prehistoric-looking waterfowl. One buffalo was so close to the car as we droveslowly by, I got nervous (as in Badlands). As I took the video, the non-agitated and presumably very relaxed buffalo proceeded to defecate. I would have had a priceless video but it didn’t take – got one last photo out of it (you can imagine the rest!)

And of course there are geysers galore. Our favorite spot was Norris. The geysers were more active than usual; a chemical phenomenon of mixing an acidic layer with neutral water added extra heat to the geysers and we got to see usually calm geysers acting up. This photo on the left was taken during a snow storm in Mammoth hot springs.

The next morning, Yellowstone was clad in white. We were appreciating the wood stove in our cabin, the “buffalo chip” wood, and extra sleeping bag that night!

Our new friends Ric and Richard (R&R) from Georgia let us know the Canyon pass was closed due to the snowstorm, saving us an hour backtracking on the way to Old Faithful. Last night we shared a wonderful meal, wine, and great conversation about community in their small town.

We will remember this next image as the river where we lost our car key. It was found again after a long search (it was in the car, nothing too exciting), but we swear we lost our thinking faculty walking through this wonderland. Another great meditation spot!

The river of the lost key

Old Faithful is the icon of Yellowstone, and it is truly amazing how it is so predictable; we got to see two eruptions 90 minutes apart, before and after our fully-satisfying meal at the Yellowstone Inn.

The Inn got more camera shots than the geysers; a man-made wonder of natural timbers.

Leaving Yellowstone would have been sadder if we didn’t have the Grand Teton National Park awaiting us across the border. So much beauty everywhere, and a more peaceful energy than Yellowstone.

We received a wonderful farewell from a family of moose in Moose (don’t they know how to name their towns). A row of camera-eyed humans and park ranger lined up across the stream gave us the tip. We hit the jackpot with a buck, his cow and calf. The park ranger warned us to get ready to leave if they got agitated; they were much closer than I could have imagined being.

After a wonderful organic dinner and "happy tea" at the Lotus Café, a night’s stay in Jackson Village’s hostel and a morning welcome from hot air balloons and mountain-launched parasailers, we headed across Idaho and Montana toward Washington. We celebrated Kule's now having been in all of the lower 48 states! We had to take a classic photo from each state – guess which is which. Yes, we did pass many potato fields in Idaho! We even stopped at an opal mining town (Spencer) and ate at a former one-room schoolhouse turned restaurant in Dell called the Calf-A!

As we left the wilderness, we got some nice shots of the Snake River… Later on, Kule was also excited to pass the exit to Glacier National Park, reminiscing about a high school wilderness trip he did with his brothers and friends.

To get to Washington we passed Idaho twice, with a stretch of Montana in-between, giving us the chance to briefly visit the hip town of Missoula. We enjoyed the huge whole foods store there. Since it is so cold there in the winter, we didn’t take more time to explore it, but it seems like a great town. We stayed in another hip artsy lake-resort town, Coeur d’Elain, Idaho, where we spent the night. We woke up to drive over the border into our last state, Washington, where we are now visiting Kule’s brother Joel and his wife Karen. It’s so nice to be welcomed into a home again! Next blog - Seattle....