The Grand Old Dame of Saint Johns

22The Saint Johns Bridge; Portland's very own.

Built before the Golden Gate, so it was the longest suspension bridge in existence for a short while. Originally slated to be painted red and white, so as to be easier to see by planes lifting off from Portland Airport, which was on Swan Island at at that time; they painted it green anyway, but Portland Airport outgrew Swan Island so fast it never really was that much of an issue.

Picture taken July, 2018.

Hood Over Powell: May, 2021

21A photo from 2021, taken looking east on Powell Blvd from the Ross Island Bridge end.

The mountain, they say, is out. And when it comes to Hood, no matter where you go ... there it is. 

The Forest At Leach Garden

20The entry to Leach Botanical Garden is just south of the intersection of 122nd and SE Foster Road in Portland. Johnson Creek runs through a gully parallel to and just south of this. 

The pictures I've shared so far were at the entry which is at the upper level. At the back of this there is a grove of evergreens, thick and primeval, clothing the slope down to the creek.

You can see SE 122nd Avenue going downslope to the bottom of the Johnson Creek gulch.

There is a 'tree walk' that allows you to be up amongst the trees. We'll view this presently.

Going into the woods is accessible to all here. 

Sunlight on the Garden

19To keep the vibe going, here's a single picture from the entrance of Leach Botanical Garden, the lawn adjacent to the pollinator garden, and the sun that drenched it that day.

The plants did as they should, playing with the light and giving it up in gorgeous green luminosity.

Sparkling Johnson Creek

18Just a picture of the sun sparkling off the rushing waters of Johnson Creek at Leach Botanical Garden.

Nothing more ... and certainly nothing less. It's a vibe. A PDX vibe.

Pollinator Plants at Leach Botanical Garden

17Here begins a series of scenes at that hidden east side Portland gem, the Leach Botanical Garden.

There's an upper area and a lower area. The geography places it along the brow of the gully that Johnson Creek cascades down before adopting a more leisurely course going west from the Lents area of Southeast Portland. This part was on the upper area and was in deliciously bright sunlight.

Click on each photo to embiggen.

Along the start of the pollinator walk.

Closeup on some pollinator blossoms

Lovely light blue blossoms. The scent was wonderful.

Even More!

One of the things I adore about plants is the way some take the light an multiply it. They don't become brighter, though, but more luminous. More vivid.

Watercolor works the same way. 

Portland Air Disaster, December, 1978

16It so happens that, on 23 December 1978, United Air Lines Flight 173 was on approach into PDX from JFK and they had a problem with the landing gear.

It took them over an hour to address the problem, during which time they ran out of fuel (there are a bunch of reasons why that happened, and I'm not going to relitigate them in a little-read blog post. Wikipedia discusses it nicely for the laity)

It crashed to earth at about 157th and E. Burnside, in an area that was, at the time, in unincorporated Multnomah County. 

What you may not know, dear Reader, is that there is a little memorial to it. Go to 164th and E. Burn, get in the westbound lane, and about 500 feet west of 164th, in front of a rather ordinary-looking deep-eastside apt complex, you'll see a crescent-shaped bit of landscaping centering a rather understated plaque:

Eight passengers and two crew died that day. And cockpit-culture reform happened; when they tell you that safety regulations are written in blood, this is what they kinda mean.

What is Leach Botanical Garden?

15What is Leach Botanical Garden?

A place with a bit more history than I knew. 

It's a most lovely arboretum. This place, located on SE 122nd Avenue just south of Foster Road, is a curated collection of native plants and native trees, arrayed on an upper level which has pollinator gardens and places for people to be and a section going down into the gully of Johnson Creek where historic structures and a very restful riparian section along the creek itself.

It is Portland's hidden garden.

Wayfinding at Leach Botanical Garden, 2026.

Stretching behind that sign are the pollinators. I'll share a few of those pictures, as well as the history that I learned, in subsequent blog entries. 

A Single Trillium

14There is a flower called Trillium. This is what one looks like:

This was taken at a lovely and unique place, the Leach Botanical Garden, in deep Southeast Portland. I will elaborate a bit on this in the next entry. 

The Way They Mark Your Order at Burger 101

13Burger 101 is a charming little dive on the corner of SW 51st St and Hwy 101 in downtown Taft in Lincoln City. They have a simple but clever menu (the Burger 101 is a single patty, Burger 202 is a double-burger, up to Burger 404 and I have the impression that the secret menu is just how many patties they'll pile on for you), the burgers are right in the sweet spot as to serving size (not too small, not to large, exactly satisfying), and great char. Fries are superb.

And here's how they mark your order:

I drug a fry through that sauce before taking the pic. Sorry about that. But so charming!

15/10 would burger again. 

The L.C. Restaurant With The Problematic Name (1957-2022)

12For those of you adore long time traditions and landmark businesses, I have some news for you.

There has been, since 1957 a family restaurant with a name that has become difficult over the years. It opened originally as "Little Black Sambo's" and has sit in the same spot in the Wecoma Beach area Lincoln City for just a s'kosh over six decades. A family restaurant, it served American diner fare: breafasts, pancakes (appropriately, if you've ever known the story), sandwiches and burgers, and sit-down dinners. 

As time passed and attitudes changed, the word "Black" was eventually dropped from the name. Known as simply "Lil' Sambo's", as of 2021, the sign outside looked like this:

While the restaurant was not quite willing to give up the brand, the name had been demoted to the bottom of the sign. The bullying tiger, who stole Sambo's shorts and parasol, was still proudly atop. Questions about whether this was a leftover of the Sambo's diner chain, to which it was never related, still were asked betimes.

When we visited in 2021 it was still going strong, rather popular. The interior was comfortable, the breakfasts good, and memorabilia of the long history of the place as well as motifs based on the Bannerman tale on full display.

Lil' Sambo's is no longer a thing. Seems the owners retired and the business has been converted to some sort of arcade and adventure zone for kids. A tarp-style sign obscures the restaurant's sign ... but the tiger still struts proud on the top.

That's all they wrote.

A Piece Of 101 In Wecoma Beach

11I've been in love with the geography of Oregon Coast towns all my life, and it began with LC. 

I was boggled, as a boy, with a town whose population didn't exceed that of my own postage stamp of a burg (Silverton) but somehow managed to have numbered streets as far as 71st in the north and 64th in the south. This, of course, derives from the way LC was formed, as a handful of communities along seven-or-so miles of US 101 in northern Lincoln County came to realize that the whole of Lincoln City would be more than the sum of its parts, and so after some vigorous discussion in the early 1960s, unified and grew from there. 

Even today they retain their historic names: Roads' End (the late-joiner), Wecoma Beach, Oceanlake, Delake, Nelscott, Taft, and Cutler City. The secret to this is, of course, that Lincoln City is long, but not very wide. Even today, while being more than 7 miles from one end to the other, most of the town is less than 3/4s of a mile wide, and the widest part in the north just berely measures a mile and a half in lineal terms. Also, the blocks are fairly small. 

And there's really only one major road from one part of the town to the other. And that's 101. 

Here's part of it in Wecoma.

Twilight At The Edge Of the World in Delake, Oregon

10There is a peculiar and keen feeling one gets when parking at the beach and letting the dark fall about one. You feel, especially if you're aware of Oregon's unique geography, that you're on the edge of the world. Town lights shine out into the darkness to the west, a beacon that few, if any, out on the Pacific, see, and the continent at your back. This is the heart of the Delake district of Lincoln City as darkness fell on the 17th. On the leading edge of summer, darkness fell slowly, but it fell hard, as it does on the Oregon Coast.

The sound of the surf nestled and comforted us; it was a feeling of sparseness but at the same time closeness and comfort. 

Now it's Fujii Time

9The Fujii Farms roadside berry and produce stand at the corner of SE Stark St and Troutdale Road, south end of Troutdale, has opened again for the season.

If you wait until later in the day, though ... you might be out of luck. 

The Willamette Not-Valley

8There's a difference in tone and atmosphere between the part of the Willamette Valley around Portland and the rest of it.

Oregon's Willamette Valley is mostly broad and rolling, with undulating areas of hills and rural farmland that seem to go on forever, and then the foothills of the Coast Range and Cascades happen. As the river bends east before going north again, at Newberg Pool (they actually call it this), it's sinuosity is constrained by hills on each side. As Hwy 99E hugs the river from Canby north into Oregon City, it seems a different place entirely, still Oregon but somehow in a different state entirely.

It's in the Willamette drainage, but, somehow, it's not part of the Willamette Valley. Not really.

As seen from I-205 southbound in West Linn

I mean, I'm not Philip Jose Farmer, but if I were, this would inspire me to write Riverworld. 

Maybe that this is the oldest part of the community we modernly call the State of Oregon, maybe that has something to do with it. 

There Is No Room 13

7There is an utterly charming, basic-basic motel on the Oregon Coast, in Lincoln City, called the Sea Echo Motel, on North Hwy 101 at 35th Street, and we are in love with this modest bit of lodging, and if just being what it was wasn't seductive enough, we found, on leaving the morning after the evening before ...

... there is not a Room 13.

You can ask and ask and ask all you want to book room 13. 

It ain't happenin', chum.

Unicorns. It's an Oregon Thing

6We have said it before and we will say it again;

Portland was built on an ancient unicorn burial ground.

It explains a great deal, you have to admit. 

This is an image I created in Photoshop years ago when I was much better at Photoshop. I see it pop up on the web every now and then and that pleases me.

But if you ever see it; that was me that did it. Yeah, you'll have to take my word for it. But I tell you the truth. 

Junki's Place Is No More

5Out at the end of Stark Street, just before you cross the bridge, there is a thing on the right and a thing on the left. On the right is a wedding venue, very romantic, with trees and waterfalls and a sumptuous building and the gate reads Yoshidas Haven Estate even though it's not called that any more on the web. It's a wedding and event venue.

On the left is a place that, until February, was a fine-dining restaurant called Junki's Riverview Restaurant. The Junki is Junki Yoshida, the man who brought easy Asian sauces to the PNW and beyond, and was reputedly quite the character.

When the Stark Street Bridge re-opened after its closing for reconstruction of the east end, I noted, going through there, that there was a sign on the gate saying it was closed for renovations through March. Now, it just said 'closed'.

The signs proclaiming Riverview Restaurant have been changed to read Sandy River Gardens.

And so it goes. 

It's Almost Fujii Time

4The farmer's roadside stand for Fujii Farms at the corner of Troutdale Road and SE Stark Street has the 'help wanted' up. Roadside produce season will commence soon ...

The last two miles of SE Stark Street are a curious thing. Along the north side, east of Troutdale Road, is a tract of berry field that still grows berries and various produce for the legendary Fujii Farms concern; it's an echo of what must have obtained all along Stark east of Portland before sprawl took over. 

I remember eating a raspberry that my wife gave me when we stopped there one very warm summer day last year or maybe the year before.

The sweetness of that berry was culinary poetry. 

ATC: Halsey Street at Sunset

3The Artist Trading Card I did today was inspired by a picture I took looking west down NE Halsey St at 201st one sunset when I was out with my wife.

Diminishing power poles have always been evocative to me.