Shore Acres - The Gardens

Day two of our trip took us to the Shore Acres State Park. We started the day at the Botanical Gardens and in a later blog probably tomorrow I'll take you on a short hike along the coast at Shore Acres and give you a little history of the Simpson Family who built the original home at this location.


The flowers were not as abundant as other visits but the ones there were beautiful.


The grounds of the garden are a great place to just walk around and the state donates a few correctional folks to help maintain the gardens along with the volunteers. I hope the work here will help prepare the young men for a better future,


This was an unusual flower of purple-red with yellow chevrons.


The Calla Lilies were still blooming.


And I can't see this place without getting the cranes in the Japanese pond.



I then went to the Rose garden to see what was there and found this one rose that looked like it was ablaze.


This rose was a delicate pink and just looked too lush to be real - but it was real.


Crimson and soft like velvet this rose is a poem looking for a poet.


There were several varieties of this flower and I'd guess what it is but I'll just embarrass myself by saying I don't know.


This one appears to by raising its petals to the sky.


There blooms were very small and I love the the gradual hue change from lavender to blue.


I love those yellow Roses.


I love them so mush I got two shots.



Talk about you weird trees - this is a Monkey Puzzle tree. It is named after the province of Arauco, the Araucaria, or monkey puzzle tree, is native to temperate and subtropical regions in Chile, Argentina, Brazil, and Australia.


...but these aren't they are however sharp and thick.


Asiatic Lilies growing in a Rhododendron bush are lovely and pink.


Oh wow another of those mystery blooms - this one is a very dark Redish-Orange


This beautiful bright orange dahlia was amazingly bright amongst the dark green foliage.


The most interesting thing today was this plant that looked like it had both flowers and beans and leaves like a Century Plant.


Sharyn calls these Target plants because every Target and Strip mall in California has a gazillion of them all around. Of course it must be Agapantha and they are common but I think still a great bloom.


Finally I returned where I came in at the gift shop where volunteers are happy to tell you about the history of Shore Acres.


Every little bit helps keep this beautiful place alive and growing.


As I was leaving I shot this picture of tiny flowers growing on a rather large bush. There are some places you just hate to leave, this is one of those places.

Scrabble Score - I must be out of it tonight I think Scrabble Queen won but I think I did pretty well.

Quote of the Day ~

Almost all words do have color and nothing is more pleasant than to utter a pink word and see someone's eyes light up and know it is a pink word for him or her too ~ Gladys Taber (1899 - 1980), Author of 59 books and columnist in the Lady's Home Journal, lived part of her life in "Stillmeadow," a 1690 farmhouse off of Jeremy Swamp Road, Southbury Connecticut.

On to Charleston and Meeting Allen Jackson

We decided to leave our sweet son Issac at home with the Chicken Pox and head off to Shore Acres in Charleston, Oregon.

Well on the way we stopped in Drain, Oregon, Gateway to the Pacific Ocean, to take a picture of an old "Painted Lady" that someone is fixing up.


Then just out of Reedsport there was the Roosevelt Elk Preserve at Dean Creek. The Elk were on a coffee break.



Next we stopped in Winchester Bay's Salmon Harbor. I found this small garden next to Kitty's Kitchen and Christmas Shop. Well I can't resist flowers so I snapped 50 or so shots and here is a sampling.


For such a small garden 10x30 feet (rough estimate) it was spectacular.


There was just about every color imaginable...


... and just about any shape.


Several were Dahlias and some I'd never seen before


I wish this picture did this one justice but it's impossible to show detail and also show the placement of each plant and the variety of colours (for any UK visitors to the blog) I added a "U".


This Dahlia I recognized as a Santa Claus Dalia from a visit to a Dalia farm but I could be wrong.


The entire garden was like a mini tour of Shore Acres where we will go tomorrow.


I am told the garden is managed and designed by a local woman who lovingly plans and cares for this gem of Winchester Bay.

Just to give you an idea of how the colors work together I included this shot.


The garden does have many Dahlias like this one...

... but there are other varieties like this Clematis that's exactly like one we have at our home.


There were a few really big bumble bees. This one was larger than the flower.


These two decided to play on a really different Dahlia shaped like a star.


Well we moved on to our campground at Oceanside RV Park. Our campsite is close to the Tenters who are nestled in the high bushes close to the ocean.


This is a great spot only a few yards from the Musemobile. I caught a few people coming around a point that leads to a very secluded, low tide only, section of beach.


We walked over to the point and climbed a little on the rocks...

... and found this interesting shape of rock bulging out of the rock floor.


While I was up higher Sharyn explored a tide pool for sea life.


Then I met Allen (or Allan or Alan) Jackson and his dog Ember who had just come back from the "Secluded " beach on the other side of the point. I had to ask how secluded the beach could be if I had seen fifteen people and three dogs come back from there. I guess not that secluded.


Ember posed for a great shot on Mr Jackson's command.


So we walked back to the Musemobile satisfied but wishing it wasn't quite so overcast. I really love the high grasses on the ocean and I think it's like a little bit of Kansas in Oregon.

Scrabble Score - Well I thought I won only to find out there we 10 letter tiles still in the bag after we scrambled the board so the game was technically a tie.

Quote of the Day ~

Probably some of the songs I never even really listened to the lyrics. Half of them I'd hear off the radio and was probably singing the wrong words and didn't even know it. ~ Alan Jackson

(born 17 October 1958 in Newnan, Georgia) is an American country singer and songwriter who has sold over 50 million records. He was influenced by the new traditional country of the 1980s, and he was one of the most popular country singers of the 1990s, blending both honky tonk and mainstream country sounds

August 1 - First Friday Art Walk

I left a little late for the Art Walk and had to run by the Barack Obama HQ to try and find Mandy to return her backpack that was left at the Cowboy Festival.


Well that made me a little late for the Art Walk but time enough to go by The Karin Clarke Gallery. I had visited there the other day but didn't get a chance to look at the paintings of Make Clarke.


I had seen some of the landscapes earlier but had not seen the paintings on the south wall.


This gentleman was looking at the Mark Clarke paintings I was more familiar with.



I really liked this style Mark had used. Bold and brilliant were the words that came to mind looking at Red Vest.


Looking at this piece with the plant in the foreground is a great example of how well this painting would look in a home or office setting.


This painting titled "Young Woman" had a very subtle beauty and I thought it may have been a painting of Karin. I did ask and she said she never asked her father if it was her. I almost felt silly for asking but then Karin told me her husband said he also thought it looked like her.


I barely had enough time to venture across the street to the Karin Clarke Annex to see what was on display there.


There were these paintings by Robert Schlegel one of my favorite artists that were in an earlier show.


I didn't get the name of this artist because they were closing but I woman and the light were a perfect play of colors.


This was an interesting vase by Faye Nakamura titled "Blooming Willow Vase"


There are the socialites in the Gallery and the "down and out" guy laying in the alley what a powerful image. Actually the guy in the alley is Frank, a friend of Vern, the fearless leader of the First Friday Art Walk group. Frank was posing in the alley for fun and didn't know I had a camera.


With the art galleries closing down people were finding Perugino a place where for coffee/tea or something stronger could be had while chatting about the art walk or life in general.


It's really darker than the picture looks and this is the White Lotus Gallery with some visitors still milling around.


I managed to stop Karin as she was locking up the gallery and managed to use my camera in the fading light to get a shot of her great smile and personality.


Another spot for coffee was Starbucks here in Eugene.


Vern, Renee and I headed to the usual spot the Cafe Xenon.


As I was leaving I noticed the really nice sign at Ambrosia a nice Restaurant & Bar across Broadway from Cafe Xenon

Broadway is a really great street to walk from Ambrosia all the way down past the Plaza at Willamette Street and on to the Obama Headquarters for Lane County. The street, like Willamette is great for galleries and great places to eat.


There are great old building and cool looking street lights.


There are white string lights in the trees in this section and at night it's a little like a wonderland.


I could come here every night just to sit and talk about the world is sit and read and sip some great Oregon Coffee.


It is my kind of place for sure.

Scrabble Score - The contender finally won on the last play of the game - the award winning word was kithe. * When I spell checked this blog the checker didn't even know the word.

Quote of the Day

"The universe is a procession with measured and perfect motion." Walt Whitman (1819-1892) from his poem I Sing the Body Electric in the Collection Leaves of Grass Published in 1855 when Whitman was in his mid-thirties.