When in Amsterdam...

Ashland, baby!

This weekend Jamie and I went on a quick get-away to Ashland. The city is located in the south end of the Rogue Valley, just 15 miles north of the California border. It's a thriving place in the summer when thousands of visitors come for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. It seems like the city is still doing well despite the recession and is seeing great revenue from tourism.

We drove down I5 along the Applegate Trail, and it was a fun ride because I have never seen this part of Oregon before. The landscape started changing as soon as we entered the Umpqua basin, more oak trees and drier landscape with scattered hills.

We stopped in Sutherlin for a quick bite at The Apple Peddler's. So random but I love it. Very American! Since I try to cut carbs I went for the taco salad while Jamie bit into a juicy burger with fries.

In Ashland we met up with our friend (and my former co-worker) Al and his wife Jodi. He treated us to a four-course dinner at an Italian restaurant called Cucina's Biazza. Very nice! We enjoyed a crisp pinot grigio and munched on olives, cheese, marianted mushrooms and bread while waiting for the courses. I loved the lemon risotto with Dungeness crab in it. Tasty. Jamie had a ravioli with a basil/tomato sauce. We didn't have room for dessert, but the funny thing was that our last course was a salad (!). Anyways, it was amazing and the sun was shining.

After dinner we took a stroll through downtown and peered into the many shops. I bought a vintage publication of W. Sommerset Maugham's Of Human Bondage at an antique store.

Later we met up with Al and Jody again at the Black Sheep Tavern for some post-midnight drinks. Fun times!

I'm out in the woods!

Talk about urban camping! I can actually get a signal and log onto the web at the Albee Creek campground in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park! Not only that, they have power outlets in their wooded seating area at the arena. Wow-y wow-y. That makes it easier for a high maintenance girl like me. We're supposedly in 'bear and cougar country' but I haven't seen any.

But what I *did* see....

*water snakes (TWO of them!!)

* lots of spiders

* an owl

* blue jaybirds (is that what you call them?)

* a caterpillar that tried to get into my beer. Yikes!

* biting flies and mosquitoes

* a dog (yay!)

The Redwoods are pretty, but I feel like it's an extended Hendricks Park! But sure, I know how to appreciate old growth forests.

Still - I am VERY excited to be on the way to San Francisco today!