When it’s November on the Oregon coast and gales are ripping in from the southwest, almost everything turns black and white. These are from Cape Lookout State Park, near Tillamook
Category Archives: Oregon
Black and White on the Oregon Coast
Also posted in black & white, Pacific Coast, Pacific Northwest
Tagged Cape Lookout State Park
Painted Hills #2
Even without the spectacle of a total solar eclipse, the Painted Hills of Oregon’s John Day Fossil Beds National Monument are a striking piece of high desert. Scroll down for photos of the total solar eclipse. Click here for a total Painted Hills/eclipse gallery.
Also posted in high desert, Pacific Northwest, solar eclipse, Solar eclipse 2017
Painted Hills: Eclipse 2017
Finally getting back to the eclipse, August 21: On the Path of Totality, total solar eclipse, Painted Hills, John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, Oregon. The top two photos are when the eclipse was total, but there was a lot more to see: the sudden gathering over a few days (and especially the night before) of an instant village of a few thousand people camped […]
Also posted in high desert, Pacific Northwest, solar eclipse, Solar eclipse 2017
Bad Day at Crater Lake
Ash from forest fires was falling on Bend, OR, a few weeks ago and smoke from more fires shrouded Crater Lake National Park, an hour and half’s drive south. The usual view of Crater Lake is of its clear, blue water, sparkling in the giant hole left when a volcano collapsed on itself about 6000 BC. We went to the park anyway, which proved again […]
Also posted in Crater Lake National Park, forest fires, Pacific Northwest
Tagged Crater Lake National Park
Black and Blue
Mountains above the North Santiam River, late afternoon light, Cascades, western Oregon.
Also posted in mountains, silhouette
Wet But Dry
The mountains of the Pacific Northwest can usually depend on snow melt and summer rains to keep things wet, but this year lack of snow and summer drought have driven water levels down. Above, Detroit Lake, in the mountains east of Salem, OR, is a dam-controlled reservoir that is drained in the winter, but it’s supposed to fill during the summer. This year it’s far below […]
Also posted in climate, Pacific Northwest
Tagged climate
Smoke Sight
How smokey is it in the Pacific Northwest? Very, depending on the day and the place, as windblown smoke from nearly 40 wildfires sweeps across the region. This was last week in the Columbia River Gorge of Washington and Oregon between Hood River and the Bonneville Dam. Video and info from a Portland TV station are here.  Â
Also posted in Columbia River Gorge, forest fires
Tagged Columbia River Gorge
Bend, OR
People in Bend, Oregon, are pretty insistent about Bend being sunny, as in more than 300 days a year that are either sunny or mostly sunny. I was there last week and there was only one sunny day out of seven (above, at Mt. Bachelor Ski Resort). The rest of the time was taken up with rain, snow, sleet and freezing rain in varying amounts, coating […]
Cool Oregon
It was hot and dry when I was in Portland in August, but it’s still extremely cool in Oregon. The Pacific currents that sweep down from Alaska make the water along the coast freezing — in the low 50s — although that doesn’t seem to hamper anybody’s enjoyment of the beach. Above, Cape Lookout State Park. Although the air temperature in Portland is 10 or more degrees […]
Also posted in Pacific Coast, Portland