Silverton to Redmond via Detroit Lakes

We stayed in Silverton, OR the first night of our latest adventure. It was a nice campground and a member of a new Camping Club, Camp Club USA, we joined. The rate was fantastic at $15 and it was a very nice campground called the Silver Spur.

On the way to our next stop, Redmond, we stopped at one of the Dams at Detroit Lakes. Detroit Dam Completed in 1953 was at the time the eight tallest dam in the world. Today standing 463 feet tall it no longer makes the tallest list.

The reservoir has a capacity of 455,000 acre-feet of water when full and 281,600 acre-feet in the summer when drawn down. Located in the North Santiam Canyon, the 9-mile long lake has shoreline of 32 miles when full.

In the distance was a logging site much like the ones we have seen on the History Channel series Ax Men.

Looking 453 feet down from the top of the dam and leaning over the edge with my Muse-o-Graphic camera in a strong wind was a little unnerving.

Hanging on the edge was worth the attempt for shots like this one...


... or this one watching the water spill over the dam's flood gates...


... down to the North Santiam river below.

The North Santiam River is a tributary of the Santiam River, approximately 90 miles long, in western Oregon in the United States. It drains an area of the Cascade Range on the eastern side of the Willamette Valley east of Salem, Oregon.

It rises in the high Cascades in eastern Linn county, northwest of Three Fingered Jack in the Willamette National Forest. It flows north through the mountains past Marion Forks, receiving the drainage from the western slope of Mt. Jefferson. Near Mt. Jefferson it turns sharply west, descending through a canyon past Idanha, Detroit, and Gates. It emerges through the foothills into the Willamette Valley near Stayton, then flows briefly southwest through the valley where it joins the South Santiam River from the northeast to form the Santiam approximately 15 miles southwest of Stayton. The confluence is approximately 10 miles east of the confluence of the Santiam and the Willamette River.

Detroit Lake is situated over a historical road bed of the former Oregon Pacific Railroad. This route was built by Colonel T. Egenton Hogg as a proposed transcontinental railroad.

I did my usual odd view pictures like this one of the guardrail on the dam...


... and this one of a glass block in the structure at the top of the dam.


There were plenty of fishermen along the edge of the dam.

The lake is adjacent to Oregon Route 22, where the stop sign is in this picture, near the city of Detroit. The lake stores water for use by the city of Salem and other nearby communities.

I liked the feeling of this child and his dad...


... so I made a second shot of the little boy on the cement divider.


The cliff above highway 22 was pretty cool and bigger than you can tell from this shot.


We finally arrived in Redmond after driving through Sisters, Oregon that got it's name from these three peaks called the Three Sisters.

The Three Sisters are three volcanic peaks of the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the Cascade Range in Oregon, each of which exceed 10,000 feet in elevation. They are the third, fourth, and fifth highest peaks in the state of Oregon and are located in the Three Sisters Wilderness, about 15 miles southwest from the nearest town of Sisters, Oregon. The three peaks have 15 named glaciers among them, nearly half of all the 35 named glaciers in Oregon. The Sisters were named Faith, Hope, and Charity by early settlers.

In 2001 a satellite discovered that there was a deforming uplift 3 miles west of the South Sister. There was concern that the mountain was awakening. In 2004 an earthquake swarm occurred with the epicenter in the area of uplift. The hundreds of small earthquakes subsided over several days. As of 2007 the uplift had slowed and concern had diminished though the area was still considered potentially active.

This potentially active volcano is approximately 35 miles (As the crow flies) from our home in Creswell and a bit North of due West.

Scrabble Score - Scrabble Queen 324 - The Contender 290

Quote of the Day ~

"The river seeking for the sea

Confronts the dam and precipice,

Yet knows it cannot fail or miss;

You will be what you will to be!"

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (American poet and writer 1850-1919)

Schreiner Iris Farm & Gardens

We left Silver falls and headed a bit north to the Schreiners Iris Farm. When we arrived there was music in the air and as we went into the display garden area it had just stopped. I couldn't help but think about the "Free Credit Report dot Com" commercial where the guys were playing at a Renaissance Faire.

Yes there was a group in full Medieval dress and a very large crowd dressed in 21st century garb.


These must be in the Garlic or Onoin family and look like the big brothers of...


... our backyard volunteers last year


The colors in the garden were spectacular
.

What surprised me was that most of the Iris plants were yet to bloom,we do need to return soon.


With the beautiful peonies and other flowers it still was a paradise.


The blues were rich and yet still there was a variety of hues...


... with some blooms having multiple colors.


One of my favorites this year were the columbines...


... the shapes were fascinating...


... and inspiring.


The buds of this tree look like our Tulip Magnolia but the white flowers are different and awesome.


Like I said earlier the iris blooms can have multiple colors.


Some glow like the sun over a purple ocean...


... others are as serene as as a big blue lake.


Some of the Iris blooms were simply one color like this purple beauty.


There were also Poppy blooms all over.


Most were a brilliant red but I did see one huge white bloom.


I call these the Halloween twins based on the black lower petals and the orange beard.


This was the deepest purple I've ever seen.


I think this was another Poppy in white with red accents.


The yellow and purple Iris was really different...


... but not as unusual as this striking Iris...


... or delicate as this light blue Iris.


There were bright yellow blooms...


... followed by some blooms that were blue and white stripped.


I think the most beautiful Iris shot of all was in colors I normally do not like together but in this shot make me pause to readjust my preferences.


I did get one last shot of a Poppy that, because of the camera exposure looks like a wonderful painting.

Scrabble Score ~ No Game

Quote of the Day

"People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us." ~Iris Murdoch

Silver Falls

We drove to Silver Falls today through fields...



... and over hills with weird trees.


When we got there the fiddleheads were dancing...

... the bridge no longer had snow ...

... and the log cabin was empty.

"In 1935 President Franklin D. Roosevelt announced that the Silver Falls area would be turned into a Recreational Demonstration Area. Private land that had been logged was purchased, and workers in the Civilian Conservation Corps were employed to develop park facilities, including the historic South Falls Lodge, completed in the late 1930s."

There were a lot of people out for a Saturday outing at the Silver Falls State Park some far below.



A few things were blooming ...


... purple flowers, small and delicate but the real draw was ...


... the waterfalls, that white dot to the left of the falls is Sharyn, a faster walker.


I tend to stop and take a picture ever 15 feet or so and just can't keep up.


The power and beauty of the falls takes my breath away and my finger clicking the camera button.


Looking up from halfway down you can almost see the mist from the falls along the rim.


There is Sharyn again with the white shirt and red sweater wrapped around her waist.

"The history of the canyon's formation begins about 26 million years ago to the Oligocene period, when most of Oregon was covered by ocean. After the waters of the ocean receded about 15 million years ago, the flood basalt flows of the Columbia River Basalt Group covered the sandstone that had been the ocean floor. The softer layers of sandstone beneath the basalt sheet eroded over time, creating pathways behind some of the waterfalls."

I think I gos shots of the falls from 360 degrees not to mention the top and bottom.

"Around 1900, June Drake, a Silverton photographer, began pushing for park status. His early photographs of the falls have become classics. An inspector for the National Park Service rejected the area for national park status in 1926, however, because logging had scarred the area with "thousands of stumps that from a distance look like so many dark headstones."

I watch the water falling and wonder just how much passes over that cliff and suspect it's enough to fill a normal swimming pool every second - amazing.


Looking through the falls is really neat and the photography is technically difficult balancing the lighting and at the same time trying to keep the lens dry.


This shot is looking up from the path directly under the falls in the recess formed over time.


Colors and motion really fill the senses here.


Looking out from under the falls at Sharyn (always a step or 300 ahead) standing on the bridge below where the water flows after taking a giant leap over the edge.


Absolutely magnificent - honestly words fail me. Yes it is possible or maybe I'm sleepy - it's almost 1:00 am


The walkway beneath the falls has a lot of tubes cut into the rock face by the constant beat of the water.


I just love the fiddleheads.


Take from 270 degrees the splash of a lifetime, it's not Niagara but then Niagara isn't surrounded by a forest. And these falls are 100 feet higher though not nearly as wide.


I did walk downstream a little...


...and captured these lower rapids...


Then turned back to take a more distant shot of Silver Falls.


On my way back up the trail I took this picture virtually at the same level as the bottom of the falls.

"The forested land of the Pacific Northwest is not a stranger to sightings of an alleged Bigfoot (or Sasquatch) and Silver Falls State Park is no exception. The area has reportedly been rich with stories of the discovery of large footprints in the forested property that makes up the park, as well as the occasional sighting of a large, unknown cryptid."

"The term Cryptid was coined by John E. Wall in a 1983 letter to the International Society of Cryptozoology newsletter.

Evidence for the existence of cryptids is typically limited to anecdotal evidence or other forms of evidence insufficient to withstand normal scientific scrutiny by the general zoological community."

I took one final shot through the trees when I got back to the top.


We stopped by an Iris Farm on the way home but I'm saving those pictures for tomorrow night. Here is a preview for Monica and Meridith.

Scrabble Score ~ Scrabble Queen 374 - the Contender 323

Quote of the Day ~

"Fallingwater one of the great blessings to be experienced here on earth, I think nothing yet ever equaled the coordination, sympathetic expression of the great principle of repose where forest and stream and rock and all the elements of structure are combined so quietly that really you listen not to any noise whatsoever although the music of the stream is there." ~ Frank Lloyd Wright (Talking about the home named Fallingwater he designed)