How I Spent My 2010 Spring Vacation: With Salem-News.com!

Note: Odd Man Out spent his 2010 Spring vacation with editors Bonnie and Tim King as his Oregon tour guides. It wasn’t exactly Homer (The Iliad and The Odyssey), but it was quite an adventure!

Salem-News.com photos

(LAGUNA BEACH, Calif.) - Having already met Tim here in Orange County CA while working on the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station rehab fiasco, I found a few days and the precious dollars to facilitate a brief, albeit whirlwind weekday tour of Salem Oregon and it’s environs recently.

This was a multi-purpose trip, allowing me to meet in person his lovely, gracious wife Bonnie and the King family-----not to mention a few members of that band of gypsies known as the S-N.com staff and friends. Part of my motivation was to view the nuances of putting the S-N.com into a cohesive package for online publication by this husband and wife team. I felt that this would help me to help them assemble my columns.

I was also quite curious about viewing the riparian and aquatic ecologies in local rural streams, plus observe the legendary Oregon coast for the first time. So I was motivated and for me personally, travel has always been money well spent, it’s rejuvenating and recharges my creative juices.

Whew! I was not disappointed. I lucked out because I had to book a month in advance to get the best rates on my hotel, car and flight package and the rain was minimal, what little of it was mostly at night.

Roger Butow and the Salem-News.com crew at Adams Rib Restaurant in Salem

Never having been to Oregon I was surprised by the skyline of Portland as we flew in via direct flight from John Wayne Airport. I guess I didn’t know just how large but yet how pleasing the general area appeared. Unlike the OC or LA, there was no hovering brownish cloud of smoke (smog), instead I saw an incredible spider’s web of meandering tributaries and rivers from my window seat.

Getting onto the 205 Freeway and circumventing downtown Portland, I found the few ephemeral showers to be a minor inconvenience on the early morning drive down to Salem in my itsy compact Chevy. Being both a strident enviro and on a tight budget, I refused the relatively cheap upgrade to a mid-size offered by my car rental firm, my compact seemed to handle the mildly rolling terrain and slick roads well anyway.

You Oregonians know how unversed and incompetent we California urban idiots can be under such conditions. Rain and driving are considered unusual twins, basically anomalous events around here. Your roads get scrubbed of hydrocarbons continuously---Ours build up oils and with infrequent heavy events, conditions are exacerbated, showers can create slimy and hazardous road conditions. Our main arterials are just humungous water slides.

Blocked from my viewing on the drive down, spectacular, snow-covered Mt. Hood and Mt. Jefferson dominated my attention on the right when I returned to Portland on a sunny day much later in the week for my flight home, majestically waving a silent good-bye to these eyes.

I happened by chance to find Sybil’s Omelettes Unlimited while trying to find my hotel near the 5 Freeway on entering Salem early in the am upon my arrival. It turned out to have what we surfer’s call “da kine grindage” (great breakfast grub) and became my morning feedbag. I stopped eating big breakfasts beginning this year as part of my diet (I’ve lost 22 lbs.) but traveling does give one an excuse to indulge, and the waitresses doted and spoiled every customer, tourist and local regulars equally. I felt treated as royalty.

I even came to anticipate. embrace and enjoy the sounds and sights of the occasional trains, I guess the Salem equivalent of the constant background noise of the Coast Highway traffic and crashing surf where my little funky shack sits here in Laguna.

Salem's native residents might find my comments objectionable, incorrect, extremely naïve or even plain nuts, but I found the downtown portion of the city an interesting navigational and mental challenge. Although several of the greater King extended family found the one way streets whacko, I was somewhat familiar with them from my city of birth, Long Beach CA. My present home city of Laguna Beach has a few too. Random (though seldom) trips to megalopolis LA, which has similar arteries, these urban planning attempts to direct and order traffic flows and vehicular concentrations can lead to a few minutes of chaos.

It definitely was amusing to ride shotgun with Bonnie and observe her knowledge of funky little diversions, small side-streets that expedited time during peak traffic hours. Sit down, buckle up, shut up and enjoy a competent, savvy woman at the wheel---Not exactly the forté of this mucho macho, typically controlling dude.

Maybe Oregonians are unaware of another thing because it’s ubiquitous: Fresh water. Water out in the open, flowing through little streams and under mini-bridges, bi-furcating neighborhoods, creating start-and-stop dead end streets, most of this water finding and joining the Willamette eventually.

Nonetheless, we here in the Cadillac Desert of Southern California just don’t see such creeks and a large river right under our noses. In fact, we only see anything close to this when it pours, when there’s a major wastewater sewage spill/overflow or one of our now infamously antiquated water mains breaches. Our streams are just channelized concrete culverts, designed to get rain as fast as possible to the sea thus expeditiously draining inland housing developments…..Which is why we have poorly charged subterranean aquifers and that dreaded, evil decimator of near-tidal marine habitats, the toxic soup that is urban runoff.

I found myself stopping and staring constantly, Salem residents probably thought me newly-discharged from a mental institute or perhaps mildly retarded, ooops, I mean “mentally challenged.” I’m 64 and being politically correct gets more difficult every year, dear readers!

Another oddity, at least for a city slicker, was the almost instant shift from winter to spring. During my 5 days, various bulbs and a saturated palette any Laguna artist would envy, that of dormant now flowering weeds which literally popped out in droves, impossibly so almost right before my eyes. One grassy, seemingly fallow and desolate-looking field near the King residence went from plain green low shrubs to an incredibly lush, mind-boggling, bursting array of color---Purples, yellows, indigo blues, both common weeds and exotic native flowers interspersed asymmetrically in Mother Nature’s own inimitable random fashion. Wow and double Wow!

I’m not being derogatory, but it also seemed weird that although it rained off and on during my stay, little old ladies (not men) also found the time between showers to jump out of their places and hand mow their lawns. I hadn’t seen humans pushing lawnmowers since growing up in Long Beach. Then too these women wore thin housedresses and slippers while I shivered in the 45-degree damp weather, wondering why I hadn’t brought my trusty thermal underwear. These women did look amazingly similar, almost clones, making me wonder if aliens had landed and had evolved into compulsive gardeners?

Aliso Beach in South Laguna, Calif. Photos by Roger Butow and John Krill

Here in Laguna, most places are perched precariously on slopes or cliffs, plus many of the residences also maximize the building footprint due to higher property values for square footage prices of living spaces. You see very little grass except in our pitifully small public parks.

We’re beach oriented, so I guess sand is our equivalence to lawn?

I found the downtown district revitalization and collision of state capital governance with collegiate atmosphere very refreshing.

I’m not much of a beer drinker in the winter, but the local brews were fun to sample. I got temporarily hooked on Black Butte Porter, kind of a designer dessert beer really, but what an unusual feast for a parched throat. It did give an unexpected quick buzz at about 5½ % alcohol, so driving was out of the question after imbibing a few!

Undoubtedly the highlight of my stay was the all day trip down the Salmon River to the Oregon coast-----I got a pre-flight lecture and stern warning about that from my girlfriend who had lived in the region back in her early years: “Roger, never, ever call it the beach, don't sound lame, Oregonians call it the coast.”

Now that I’ve been, I can see why. Much of it is rocky, sheer basalt and volcanic looking cliffs dropping off to pounding surf, or maybe I should say wave and tidal action because surfing only takes place in strategic, accessible spots. Sandy beaches are few and far between, plus it was kinda windy (for me, probably lulls or doldrums for locals) but the strands I saw must be jammed in the summer.

With Bonnie driving, me riding shotgun and Tim in the back of the van fiddling with his equipment (his camera equipment, OK?), this was a spectacular road trip for someone unused to winding roads, endless trees, and the proverbial multiple tributary and river transits. Bridges and more bridges, various creeks with names I lost track of in a vertiginous rush.

Even the mish-mash, the complex mixture of names, some Anglo and some Native American mimed the ecologies---Verdant, dense stands of trees then BAM! Eye-popping, open plush meadows with sweet grasses, horses and cabins, funky little businesses with pithy signs. Trippy, very trippy as we said back in the day.

From Lincoln City down to Otter Rock and Newport, there’s no way I can describe the area any better than previous visitors or even local brochures verbiage attempts to portray---So I won’t, beyond saying that I see why folks have second homes here or live year round in these parts. Siletz Bay and Devils Lake were great too, seems like there’s something for every age group, hobby and interest. Hyperkinetic me experienced a noticeable slowing down.

We stopped at Depoe Bay and Harbor, watched a Coast Guard rescue craft “shoot the hole,” which if you don’t see it personally I’m not quite sure how to explain it.

Salem-News.com's Bonnie King and Roger Butow discuss his visit to Oregon from Laguna Beach, California, where he is based as the group's environmental writer

There’s a high bridge on 101 spanning a very narrow gorge, and after some strategic maneuvering the boat basically surfed its way through the gap and into what they claim is the world’s smallest harbor, all 5.5 acres of it. All hands were on deck, I assume to jump if things go bad.

If your idea of a thrill ride is to ride a fishing boat or craft through a teensy, 50-foot wide slot in and out all of the time, then Hey, go for it! My Dad was an LA Harbor tugboat captain for decades, my only regret was that I didn’t see this with him. It defies comprehension, and once again better parties have tons of accounts posted online over the years.

Hopefully Tim has attached the spontaneous video interview he and Bonnie got out of me right there on the spot. I have no recollection of what I babbled, that’s how stunned I was by the coast and particularly Depoe---Which I of course kept pronouncing like “De-foe,” instead of “Depot” to Bonnie’s amusement. She also had to correct me several times as I kept putting the syllabic accent of “Willamette” in the wrong place!

Odd Man Out isn’t speechless or short on thoughts often as his So Cal beach bros know, but my brain couldn’t fathom (little ocean joke there), couldn’t completely grasp what I tried to wrap my brain around that day.

Roger Butow's day on the Oregon Coast included stops at Devils Punchbowl at Otter Rock, Boiler Bay, Depoe Bay, Salishan, Lincoln City's 21st Street, Taft, Devils Lake and the Salmon River Estuary.

It wasn’t just the sheer expanse: The Depoe Bay part seemed beyond comprehension, like why in the heck did somebody, anybody think that this concept was viable in the long run? We are a strange species, insinuating and populating the wildest and adverse of places, no matter how complicated, dangerous, climatically unsuitable or plain edgy the environs we must cling to.

Dr. Arne Naess, the godfather of Deep Ecology is one of my heroes. I think he would have found this coast to his liking, minor pockets of dense development notwithstanding. Readers might want to read up on this relatively recent construct as it might resonate with them.

Here’s a quote from Stephan Harding’s 2002 book “What Is Deep Ecology?”:

“The phrase "deep ecology" was coined by the Norwegian philosopher Dr. Arne Næss in 1973, and he helped give it a theoretical foundation. For Dr. Næss, ecological science, concerned with facts and logic alone, cannot answer ethical questions about how we should live. For this we need ecological wisdom.

Deep ecology seeks to develop this by focusing on deep experience, deep questioning and deep commitment. These constitute an interconnected system. Each gives rise to and supports the other, whilst the entire system is, what Dr. Næss would call, an ecosophy: an evolving but consistent philosophy of being, thinking and acting in the world, that embodies ecological wisdom and harmony. Dr. Næss rejected the idea that beings can be ranked according to their relative value.”

We lucked out, there wasn’t any rain all day on our coastal sojourn, nothing to obscure pristine views until we started back through the mountains towards Salem where we hit a brief downpour near the summit. It took me several hours to tether my open, slack-jawed mouth that day, but a week later I still haven’t ceased my awe.

I’d like to add that I found everyone I met extremely friendly, more hospitable than I’m accustomed to here back in “civilization.” Which leads me to believe that maybe a more laid back, country lifestyle IS more civilized and that I’ve become jaded by urbanization. Living in a year round, international tourist destination resort like Laguna Beach has effected my way of processing info and my interface with visitors and locals alike. In a way, I’ve come to resent tourists and the local businesses that cater to them.

I even found the ice I discovered my last 2 mornings on the windshield of my rental car amusing, go figure? Air bitingly cold but invigorating, not infested with that metallic taste, that ozone and airborne contaminant-laden taste so typical of So Cal, you can take a deep breathe without wheezing in Oregon.

Like fish swimming in water that have no idea what they’re moving in or through, I’m not too sure if we locals are stupidly accustomed to thinking smog is the norm, our milieu. Do Oregonians know how special their state is, revel in or appreciate it, or do they take it for granted, maybe gripe about creeping urban sprawl?

I can honestly say that on my “Stranger in a Strange Land” trip to Oregon, I got nothing but good vibes and welcoming smiles, there was a lot more civility than the brusque, almost rude responses I constantly observe around here. Sometimes that rude dude is me, venting my frustration over the holiday invasions when seemingly lost, mindless visitors gawk, gab on their cell phones as they drive one-handed and flip you off if you honk.

Maybe OMO is just getting soppy, sentimental and senile, but I think that maybe my experience in Oregon had something to do with all of that the water up there. It’s everywhere---Falling from the skies. Running down the streets and gutters. Sitting in fresh, muddy puddles, replenishing plants and quenching small critters, running in all of those tributaries, rushing pell-mell in the rivers, dotted boutique lakes in abundance and the broad expanses of open range and agricultural fields, never relenting or forgetting their eventual destination of a Pacific Ocean section I had only dreamed about.

Now, for me, Oregon means wilderness, or as Dr. Naess uttered “Wildness for its own sake.”

FYI: If a project near you has some interesting enviro-aspect(s) that you think is/are worthy of Salem-News.com coverage and our readers attention, feel free to contact me with a very brief synopsis. Water-related “Blue Interventions” are my specialty!

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Launched in 2010, Odd Man Out is the creation of Roger von Bütow and his OMO columns are written exclusively for Salem-News-com. Born and raised in the LA Harbor area, son of a German immigrant father, he's been in Orange County for 45 years and is a 38-year resident of Laguna Beach, Ca. In 1998, he began his professional career in environmental review processes (CEQA, NEPA, MND, MND and EIR/EIS). He's a rare mix of cross-trained builder, writer and consultant as he brings his extensive construction experiences dating back to 1972 into his eco-endeavors. He has tremendous field and technical expertise in successful watershed restorations, plus wastewater, urban runoff, water quality monitoring/improvements and hydrologic mechanisms. He's built everything from commercial spas to award-winning private residences, and provided peer review and consultant analyses for single homes, subdivisions and upscale resorts.