RISING WATERS IN MEDFORD
I don’t have a before photo but to get an idea the river side of the bridge support usually has homeless people camping under it…to keep from getting wet!
AUTZEN STADIUM AND PK PARK
Well I ran over from Trader Joes and crossed a bridge where I saw this …
This is a neat sculpture outside the sports complex
At the bottom of each X and O is an inspirational quote…I took photos of the ones that could be applied to everyone not just football….this was my favorite one!
Now if only certain CEO’S…politicians could absorb the next one….I
OREGON BUCKET LIST 1
After two years of dreaming of Montana I may finally be moving and OOPS! I haven’t seen and done all in Oregon that I wanted to. With work and packing I don’t think I’ll have time to get too much of the list done. At the very top of my bucket list was visiting my childhood friend Cindy. She lives near Eugene and we met at Trader Joes where I took the snowflake ornament photo.
We had an early dinner and hung out. We had a great time and talked and talked its a wonder the restaurant didn’t throw us out! On the way to her house to meet her children we stopped at Market of Choice which was across the street from the new Matthew Knight Arena…an absolutely beautiful building! Even at night. I had to take a photo! It took awhile to get a photo without a line of cars and since I didn’t know how long my friend would be shopping I didn’t want to cross the street!
Now for my pet peeve….they spend millions of dollars on this beautiful arena…and stick some trees in front?? The word arena is covered up by the Christmas tree….and its not much of a Christmas tree. It is amazing to me that not one person working on this project has bothered to step back and get an overall view not just from this angle but from EVERY angle. Its too easy to be hyper-focused on the trees (figuratively speaking of course) and the first thing a designer should learn is to step back and look at the whole forest….it should be done on a daily basis…like a meditation. Clear the mind and pretend like you just dropped down from the moon. That there is a crane out front should not be an excuse for the half-lit tree blocking the arena sign. People know a crane is for construction purposes…HURRY UP!!! LET’S BUILD A BEAUTIFUL ARENA THEN HIDE THE NAME WITH TREES….MAKE PEOPLE GUESS WHAT IT IS!…luckily the other tree has lost its leaves! Maybe they should build a brick wall around it too!
I have to interview in Portland next week so on my way back if I have time I’ll take more photos…It is really a beautiful building and University of Oregon has much to be proud of!
I usually don’t like to stay the night at peoples houses but Cindy and her children were so gracious and playful and I probably won’t see them again I wanted to catch up as much as I could I took lots of photos of the kids but I don’t like to put up pictures of other peoples children on my blog so….this is the only one out of the bunch of just Cindy telling me all about her property. She is most talented and has built and designed many of the structures herself! She is amazing of course now I regret not taking photos of her projects….
As always it was nice to see a patch of blue sky! I had a great time catching up and of course regret that I didn’t make the time earlier….my goal is to stop procrastinating so much next year!
ANOTHER USE FOR DUCT TAPE
While out walking I came across a store front of candy canes….on closer inspection I had to laugh at the use of duct tape. Gotta figure that a man put those up!
CHRISTMAS IN GRANTS PASS 3
Close up of the town Christmas tree….
Christmas display at a tea shop…
I have never noticed this local bar….the WONDER BUR..
And this is FROSTY THE SNOWMAN!!!
Since this is Grants Pass you can be sure that FROSTY isn’t filling his pipe with tobacco…
an antique store…
a vintage clothing store…Love the makeup job!!
TOY STORE!!!
O.K. this has to be left over from the Paloma Picasso xoxo era when scribbles were the rage. These are in front of an auto dealership the downtown has much better taste!
More of the music boxes…
This is like a mini theater that tells THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS. The display is back at Taprock.
Taprock sits along the bank of the Rogue and there is a nicely landscaped trail that runs along for a bit. These are of the lights reflecting on the water.
CHRISTMAS IN GRANTS PASS 2
Every year I have to listen to religious whackos claiming that people are trying to destroy Christianity…but as I drive around I see that every town and many churches have nativity scenes. Yep thats right folks this on top of the Grants Pass tourist information. No one is throwing rocks at baby Jesus…I don’t know why people are so paranoid and hysterical…THE SKY IS FALLING THE SKY IS FALLING! And these same people want to take the right of others to display their traditions.
I was hoping to photograph more of these displays but then time became frantic! There are some really cool church lights but not on the main drags which is where I have been heading to get in my exercise!
This is down G Street the “artsy” street in Grants Pass!
Norris has all of the high end earthy shoes, Keene, Merrill, Teva, Birkenstock…
Here is the town Christmas Tree!!
All of the doors and windows are decorated!!
I love all of the cotton balls in this window…
NEON at the bike shop…
Here is a little Nativity set…
CHRISTMAS IN GRANTS PASS
That’s the Grants Pass slogan! And I must say compared to where I grew up its a hell of a lot less rainy and hardly ever snows. And of course the Beautiful Rogue River runs right through town!
This is the newer tourist part of town Hell Gate tours are located here…Its a jet boat ride down the Rogue. Across the street they built a “tourist” restaurant called Tap Rock. I have never been there but know people who say its a fun place to have dinner.
The above is on Hell Gate and below is at Taprock.
More of the lighting displays..
I may have known this but forgot! I learn something new every day and some times I re-new…
The lights spell it out!
all of the lamp posts have halos…
the roof of a bank is will lit with displays. It shares the parking lot with Taprock..
This is a neat display. They are big black boxes placed around town and they play Christmas songs. As the song plays the lights on the sign change with the activity in the song. This one plays ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS MY TWO FRONT TEETH.
the main drag…
Display window of a vintage shop
the Italian restaurant has these colorful flowers as one would expect from the old country…
OH TANNENBAUM !
WINTER WONDERLAND!!!
CHRISTMAS IN CENTRAL POINT
Central Point and Medford sort of merge in the rural sort of way…a few miles of farms in between. It’s easy to forget they have a cute downtown area if you are not specifically headed in that direction. Which is why I ended up taking this evening walk. I took a wrong turn and ended up going through town.
This town has character! More than Medford which has a bit bigger old town and hosts a Rogue Valley Community College location. Here is the Saddle shop.
Of course the windows are all decorated for Christmas!
Everyone on the West Coast knows how good See’s Candy is! They were out of the molasses chips which are my personal favorite. These little trailers are run by the Kiwanis a non-profit that helps out the local elderly, and children.
This was taken at the florist shop. Their fresh arrangements had already been taken out of the windows and they were getting ready to close for the evening..
Finally the traffic let up enough so I could get a decent picture of the main st.!
The Mexican restaurant.
All around town are these mosaic tiles.
The grain elevator is the icon of Central Point. I love grain elevators! Of course I wish I had taken a better photo.
The snowflakes on the light posts…otherwise you don’t see much snow!
The Police station has a beautiful tree all lit up! You can’t tell in this photograph but it has lots of ornaments on it too.
Everything is closed by now except for the restaurants…
This is a Chinese restaurant…I couldn’t decide which photo I liked best so I put them both up!
CHRISTMAS IN GRANTS PASS coming soon!
CHRISTMAS IN MEDFORD 2
The view of “old town” as it is getting dark…
There is a lovely little “gourmet” market that opened up. I have gourmet in quotes because they don’t quite hack it in the gourmet department but in Medford it could pass for gourmet. They do have a nice selection of gourmet pastas and sauces imported from Italy. Pricey! They also make their own desserts and have a small lunch menu.
I bought some over priced pasta (guilted by how helpful the man running it was. He even sold me a cup of cold soup after hours to heat up at home! It was spinach and chickpea. I was quite surprised when I got home to find out it wasn’t a blended soup with some sort of curry. It was clear broth with chickpeas and whole baby spinach floating around. Excellent. If I had made it the baby spinach would have been overcooked due to neglect! Looking at the menu as I ate, I would go back during lunch, order a main item and get the cup of soup for free instead!
They did a great job with the decor I hope they survive. My guess is that their lunch menu is the main draw. They don’t quite have the experience or knowledge to run a spectacular store and their prices are too high for mediocre groceries. For the square feet of space they have allotted which isn’t very much (someone likes clean design) they should be buying the best of the best! Five years of living in Medford I am still not familiar with Medford’s elite…but in the age of cooking and travel programs galore knowledge of superb food is no secret.
They may just lack the money for inventory and if that is the case they do a good job merchandising the store to look like it is intended to be a sleek high-end gourmet market.
Excellent job with the decor!
More of the downtown lights….
This is the town center and I am sure it is put up by the City of Medford. What I picture is that one day someone got the bright idea to decorate the downtown. Christmas lights attract visitors. But they delegated the buying to some secretary who had a catalog in front of her…..I’ll get some Santas…and some elves…and…. The rest of the decor the white lights in the trees that line the streets is nice and sleek. They put up the giant Christmas tree which is beautiful….
The the poor statue of the chess player has to stare at all of these juvenile prefab Christmas shapes.
The Ginger Rogers Craterian Theater is on the other side of the park…..the rest of the park should have stayed with the “starring” theme.
Lights run across buildings…
well this is not a Christmas photo but a plant under a light in front of a Mexican restaurant!
These are lighted grape clusters in the window of a thrift store…
and one of the furniture stores always has their windows decorated….
Coming soon….Christmas in Central Point!
CHRISTMAS IN MEDFORD
Medford is all decorated and I finally walked around downtown to capture the holiday season. I love that there are still people who paint store windows….
Here is a jewelry store..
Tattoo shop
And this beautiful little wreath introduces a dried flower shop.
The town Christmas tree!
Lovely display of giant pine cones.
I love these little lights on the bare branches..
The bell tower…
Irish Pub good place to recover during the holidays….shopping…visiting relatives…
The old train depot is now a restaurant. Lovely decorations.
This beauty is right in front of my apartment building.
EVENING RUN IN MEDFORD
I love branch silhouettes against the evening sky…
I guess this is supposed to be Santa peeing….
What Jesus wishes Christmas was really about…
a couple of decorated houses not far from my house…
CHRISTMAS LIGHTS IN KLAMATH FALLS
Old Town Klamath Falls is beautiful at night and interesting during the day!
The Pendelton Blanket Horsey!…at Drew’s of course!
Some of the shop windows…..
Outside a Mexican restaurant…
SNOW ALONG THE GREENWAY
These are from last week when Medford had a dusting of snow. Medford doesn’t get much snow it lies in the Rogue Valley which is surrounded by mountains and they get snow so you don’t have to drive far during the winter.
I went out for a run and this is right outside of my apartment.
Of course along Bear Creek Greenway where I do most of my running.
Dead horsetail.
TOU VELLE TWO
You would think since it was Thanksgiving Day and freezing that the park would be empty but not so. There were at least 10 fly fishermen actually standing in the freezing water! I had on five breathable layers on top and it took about a half mile of running to get warmed up. Then when I would stop to take pictures or switch to walking for too long I would start to get cold again. Near the end of my excursion it had warmed up a few degrees but not enough for me go stand in water!
I will have to come back in springtime when things are green. It is pretty now but in the spring with the flowers in bloom…
Mt. McLaughlin..
This is a big marsh in spring time…
The Rogue River you can barely see them but there are two men fishing in the river.
a little closer…
Another man fly fishing…the dry riverbanks are right there why stand in the cold water??? I secretly admire people who do crazy things!
You can reserve picnic areas…
Seriously who leaves their business card in an outhouse??
That is Table Rock Road
Ice formation looks like a…
I’m not sure why this is here looks like a trap of some sort.
TOU VELLE
It was freezing this morning so I put on five layers and decided to pay five dollars to go running (and take pictures) at TouVelle State Park….it isn’t far from my house but in the five years I have lived in Medford I have never been! Thank God for a blue sky today. It was much appreciated!!
I don’t know why but its much easier to run in the cold…probably because my body would rather warm up than be lazy! Cold can be a motivator. There are nature trails here I logged in almost five miles including a jaunt on the bride to the other side of Table Rock Rd. to the boat ramp. I’m not sure how far the trails went because I turned around when I started running to big pickups and lots of gunfire. Target practice but I think that you can duck hunt around there so I headed back. Probably being overly cautious…its not like Dick Cheney lives here!
Anyway when I uploaded my NIKE+ it had 270 miles logged so far!
It is a nice place to go running…
I’ll bet the marshes are beautiful in the springtime!
Upper Table Rocks…
Mt. McLaughlin…
It truly is a beautiful day!
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