Sacramento, Medford to Portland, Oregon 7/09 - 7/12/2024 Portland, Oregon - Columbia River RV Park

                                                          From: casarollnotes.blogspot.com                                                                                                      Tim and Linda Bunyan

We depart Sun City July 2024

We departed Sun City   

early, eager to leave the Sacramento Valley with temperatures of over 100 degrees. 

First day drive through Northern California to Medford, the first night, then onto Portland, Oregon.

 We arrive at Harvest Host at the National Register of Historic Places: EdanVale Winery in Medford, Oregon for our first night on the road again!

We park (Harvest Host - free) among the gardens and orchards.  The mansion was established in 1885 as Oregon's first Pear Orchard.  We enjoyed the air-conditioned tasting room with five other women tasting while Tim and I selected the pear cider and cranberry cider to our delight.  We chose The Charcuterie Board with our tasting as the perfect fit for an evening dining out.

In the pioneer days of the Rogue River Valley, this land lay between two of the few established settlements, what would soon become known as Ashland Mills and Jacksonville, Oregon.  Cultivation began in 1853.  The same year the nearby town of Medored was incorporated, Joseph H. Steward, an enthusiastic fruit dealer from Chicago, purchased the 160-acre property and planted the first commercial pear orchards in the United States.

In reverence to the past, we toasted with pear cider in the vineyard/orchard tasting room and settled into a rest for our first day which always takes a prior week of early sunrise mornings to get things organized, cleaned, and packed to comfort level in the RV.

Onto Portland Oregon.

 Signs along the Travel Tour - even Truckers need the Lord (photo taken at a truck stop).

PORTLAND - We decided to change our plans from the Elks Lodge to confirm a reservation in Columbia River RV Park, located about 5 miles north of Portland. 

Eager to see the river city: Portland, Oregon.

 We found the area not as bicycle-friendly as we had anticipated, so we drove to Portland's Peral District.  We enjoyed our visit to Portland's iconic bookseller: Powell's City of Books,

the headquarters that claims to be the 

largest independent new and used bookstore in the world!

 The book: "Horse" was written by Geraldine Brooks.  I bought it ......It was recommended and I want to read it and also pass it along to Jason.  He has little time to read so this is selected as a narrative among three related stories about an enslaved man grooming a winning thoroughbred in the mid-1800s, the early years of horseback racing.

 

The City of Books has nine color-coded rooms and over 3,500 different sections.

 We were sure to have a spot and a location much more interesting as it is located near the marina on the Columbia River.

Tim and I set out for a walkabout Fort Vancouver to find it was established as a fort in 1849 while it was bargained from the 1st Regional Port of the Hudson's Bay Company in 1825!  In 1869 Oregon Trail immigrants (all 500,000) traveled 2,000 miles to arrive in this area and be 'taken in' by the British leader of the HBC.

Fort Vancouver was a 19th-century fur trading post built 1824-1825.  It was the headquarters of the Hudson's Bay Company's Columbia Department, 

located in the Pacific Northwest.  The Army facility continues in operation.

Onto Washington to visit Mike and Paul at their home in the Northwest seaside resort in Semiahmoo, Washington.