Down River and Far BeyondAs I said, Tuesday was to have been our lazy day, but with Fred, there's no such thing. I was more than happy to sit on the deck, drink coffee and watch the wild turkeys. Wild turkeys have been very successfully re-introduced into Oregon and they are beautiful birds. We saw the local flock of 20 or so several times and found a feather. And as it turns out the feather that I picked up in Massachusetts several years ago, a nice beige and brown striped feather that I told my grandson was a raccoon feather, turns out to be from a wild turkey! He never believed it was from a raccoon anyway. But no turkey-watching this day, Fred had come up with a special treat; the target was not exactly in the Rogue Valley, not even in the state, but the Native Americans and pioneers didn't differentiate, so why should we? Off we went.First we stopped in Eagle Point to look at the Butte Creek Mill and Country Store. Eagle Point is a community of about 7,000, charming and historic. The gristmill here has been in almost constant operation since 1872 and helped make Eagle Butte a trading center for farmers and Native Americans for many years. (Here's a Wikipedia article about gristmills for those of you who are interested. The day we were at the Butte Creek mill was a maintenance day--they weren't grinding anything. But that was even better because we got to go into the grinding room, look down into the millrace, test the surface of the millstone (brought around the Horn many years ago), finger the flour on the floor, run the relay bins up and down, and generally have a grand time talking to Bob, the new owner. As it turns out, Bob and his wife, Debbie, lived in Portland until a year-and-a-half ago, but are enthusiastic about the town, the mill and their products. After sampling what we bought, we are also enthusiastic about their products. The method of grinding retains all the grain's bran and germ, making for tasty and healthy flours. All of their grains and mixes have proved to be wonderful and quite reasonably-priced. Many are available mail-order, but the store is also chock-full of specialty jams, honey, spices and herbs. For example, I bought a little baggie of Spanish smoked paprika probably about two ounces, for 80 cents! Not only is this hard to find, this is a very good price. We each bought some household things and some Christmas gifts and then went next door to the antique shop. The shop, at this point, holds Bob's excess collection of antiques. Bob says that was the deal--Debbie agreed to move to Eagle Point and run the mill store, if Bob agreed to sell off some of his collections. It's an excellent antique store, everything has been lovingly chosen at some point. I *almost* bought a salt cellar to go with my collection, but the only one he had that I don't have was a blown-glass swan that cost $26--too rich for my blood. (As they say. Where did this come from anyway? Cliches are sometimes not so obvious.) From Eagle Point, we went to Central Point, another interesting, and larger, town. Central Point has about 15,000 people, its economy based on agriculture, tourism and timber. We only had one destination today, though -- the Rogue Creamery. There were three great cheese-making enterprises in Oregon--Tillamook Country Creamery on the north coast, Bandon Creamery on the south coast and this one. Since Tillamook bought Bandon a few years ago and shut down Bandon production, that leaves two. Tillamook is known best for cheddar and jack, Rogue for blue and gorgonzola. I could repeat it all, but the site has done a fine job of explaining the unique quality of their blue here. This is cheese that sells for well over $10/lb but it's worth it. We tasted a bunch and bought some, too. AND I bought a cheese-making kit. Who know? It may become my retirement profession. Also I got a recipe for fried cheese-curds, which no one with a heart should eat but here it is. Our next errand was to pick up a blown-glass hummingbird feeder from one of the (many) arts and crafts folks in the Illinois Valley, a bit further west and almost to the California border. Fred had ordered this feeder at the Country Fair earlier this summer and since we were in the neighborhood it seemed like a good opportunity to stop. So we called for directions (aren't cell phones handy?) and said we'd be there soon, because we wanted to go to lunch a bit further down the road at the Patrick Creek Lodge, just over the border into California. But the glassblower's wife (there's a book title in there, I'm sure) convinced us to stop at Taylor's Sausage, Inc. in Cave Junction. (BTW, we stopped at Patrick Creek for a quick drink on the way back and the Lodge looks like a grand place to stay sometime in the future.) We were glad we changed, because Taylor's Sausage was great. They make 160 kinds of sausages, and are a full-scale butcher shop selling everything you can imagine that relates to meat and game. They also have a game (and maybe domestic animal) dressing, cutting and packaging plant. I didn't find out how much it costs, although I knew you would be interested, but Fred was anxious to get going. Anyway the lunch was excellent and very inexpensive, we bought quite a lot of nice sausages, a smoked turkey leg, etc. They have local honey. They have Umpqua Ice Cream. And they have EIGHT different sulfite-free wines. Good place, go there if you're in the neighborhood. (An aside from later. Last week we ate one of the packages of frozen sausages I bought at Taylor's -- the pork, apple and fennel. Absolutely fabulous. A very fine grind, flavorful but subtle, really nice with the last of the neighborhood farmer's market corn. And enhanced by just a touch of walnut mustard from Laurent du Clos. Wonderful.) Now it's probably time to verify that we were on the Redwood Highway (Hwy 199) and on our way to see the redwoods! This was my special surprise. But before I tell you about them, I need to tell you about a dam. This is the only dam I've ever seen being dismantled and although it's quite small as dams go, it was still interesting  . This is the Savage Rapids Dam on the Rogue River owned by the Grants Pass Irrigation District. It was purely an irrigation dam, no official flood or fire control responsibilities. The dismantling will remove a barrier to the threatened Rogue River Coho salmon and steelhead, so they can get up the river and spawn. After a 20-year process, everyone seems fairly happy now, but it has been a long, rancorous discussion. If you want to get a little flavor of the battle while it was raging, check this article from a local who hasn't given up.Oh, also a bit about the Illinois Valley because I was surprised there were so many old hippies out here in the middle of pretty conservative Josephine County. Our directions to the glassblowers' took us back into this little valley that's quite flat and looks arable, but we didn't see much farming going on--a few cattle, some vineyards, funny little roads that wandered into the woods. Fred says there used to be gold-mining and the valley is mostly mine tailings so that's why no agriculture. He says that even when he was a child, the valley was mostly populated by folks marching to their own drummers. The housing certainly reflects the eclectic taste and circumstances of the residents. There are a few double-wides, a sheepherder's wagon or two, quite a few houses made from 4 x 8 sheets of corrugated tin, shacks that have been added on to four or five times in four or five different building materials, prefab shops made into residences--just a huge variety of "use what you've got" housing. There also are a few beautiful modern places and several well-kept modest cabins. And one barn with a gorgeous 15 foot mandala painted on its side. I don't have any pictures because, frankly, I was a bit apprehensive about getting out of the car, even in the areas where whiffs of marijuana could be savored on the open air, which *should* indicate mellow people, right? I'm sure that most of the people here just mind their own business and make jewelry, throw pots, blow glass, tan and tool leather, etc. and in-breed. The homestead of the people Fred was buying from was perfectly fine, a shop, a mobile-home, couple of out-buildings, some nice old dogs. But I was still a little uneasy about the whole thing and glad to move off the backroads and back on to the highway. NOW we get to the redwoods. Well, after we drove for quite a while more down the Smith River, the last free-flowing rive in California I think. It's very beautiful. The water was very low. To see the redwoods, we went to Stout Grove in the Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, just outside of Crescent City. This grove has only been available seasonally via bridges that aren't open all year round. There was some evidence that that is no longer true, but the National Parks Service web sites indicated that the Grove is only accessible in the summer. If you decide to go, check it out with them so you won't be disappointed. And now that I've built to this experience, I find myself at a loss for (very many) words. If being in the Avenue of the Boulders was a magical experience, this was a spiritual one -- more sober, quieter; adult, rather than adolescent; reflective rather than active. Wandering nearly alone in these old-growth stands, among the huge trees, the tallest living things on earth. I wanted to touch all the trees, soothing then where some dammnfool (well, actually many damnfools in several alphabets) had carved initials into them. Apologize for the human race and tell them we're getting better. I had very similar feelings when I sat very close, watching a resting manatee in Florida. He/she had damnfool propeller scars. Both the trees and the beasts survive from an earlier age--redwoods originated about 65 million years ago, manatee ancestors are said to be 50 million years old. And they are both mysterious, powerful, soothing, enduring. These feelings seem impossible to convey in words OR pictures, but here are a few to help your imagination along. Oh, and if this grove looks a little familiar even if you haven't been there, you may recognize it as the extraterrestrial setting for the Ewoks scene in the third Star Wars movie, "Return of the Jedi."
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