So he shares with me one of the local secrets. That passion aside, Rob quickly learned that my default footwear is hiking boots - not the spike heels I dance in. Ironically, for two people who crave cool and wild spaces, Rob and I met on a hot, crowded tango dance floor in a city. The weather often changes dramatically on the western end, where there’s less precipitation. Then we enter the Petersen Tunnel, one of those fiercely gouged wormholes through rocky mountain into another universe. Even the bark looks green.” I notice a drunken forest of Sitka spruce - the trees tilt in the spongy ground. Their bees may yield raspberry or blueberry honey, “depending on what they were pollinating,” Jerry says.Ĭontinuing west, Rob notes, “We’re passing through real rain forest - more than 100 inches of rain a year. For 22 years, Jerry and Sandra Collver have cultivated an astonishing array of produce on their 10-acre farm. Its peaked roof and white boards speak of simpler times, as does the 1884 Walton Store and Post Office we passed earlier, where locals still get mail, groceries or a cup of coffee.Ī few miles past the post office, a painted sign promises honey, smoothies, kale and more at Morning Glory Farm & Espresso, a café-market with picnic grounds. (Late fall, it’s steelhead.) A few paces up the riverbank, Rob shows me the 1925 Wildcat, one of 20 historic covered bridges in Lane County. The river gentles over boulders and a drift boater lazes in the distance, perhaps dreaming of the salmon run come early fall. We walk down the boat ramp in time to catch a rock-perched fly fisher, excited about her baited trout, fall in up to her waist. We stop to see this confluence at Austa Landing County Park. Spilling into the Siuslaw ( sigh-YEW-slaw, Yaconan for “far away waters”) from Cougar Pass, the highest point on 126, is Wildcat Creek. The café also serves dinner, with a full bar and a tempting menu of fresh seafood, local produce and Oregon wines.īeyond Veneta, the forest closes in dark and velvety and hides the headwaters of the Siuslaw River that parallels the road. ![]() ![]() But for home-baked marionberry pie à la mode, we linger in the stained-glass sanctuary. A loaf to go of potato rosemary, herb Parmesan or oat walnut makes for good road food. The village’s steepled white church no longer delivers sermons, but the staff of life: It’s been converted into a café-bakery called Our Daily Bread. Just beyond Fern Ridge is Veneta, the last gas before heading west for 40 miles. Sailboats and canoes ply the calm waters, swimmers have a designated beach and lakeside campgrounds let travelers sleep amid the pines. There, marshes and wetlands attract waterfowl and migratory birds, including cranes, egrets, mallards and grebes. “By the time we reach the coast, it’ll be 10 to 25 degrees cooler,” Rob says as the farms give way to Fern Ridge Lake. My sense of time recalibrates as the road leads first through rolling farmland.Ībout three miles from Eugene, summer fades even in August. I find the entire drive refreshing and can almost feel my blood being oxygenated, buddy breathing with all these photosynthesizing behemoths. ![]() I fly from San Francisco to Eugene in June to visit Rob, and we drive the snaking 65 miles - 75 minutes if we don’t dawdle. 26 Travel section, an article about a drive along Oregon’s Highway 126 mentions traveling west from Eugene and seeing views of the Cascade Range.
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