What is it With Sand Dunes?

First I must tell you, that in response to our inland trip to Sisters, Oregon, an Oregonian told me the name of The Three Sisters Mountains. They are Faith, Hope and Charity. And he asked if I knew why they named a lake Senoj. The name isn’t misspelled nor is it a Native American name. Can you figure out the answer? (I will tell you in the next blog.)

Okay onto the coast trip. Here we go.

On our last Oregon Coast trip, we began in Eugene and aimed north. You might have read about it, the Cannon Beach, Beverly Beach trip.

This time we aimed south. We spent the night in Reedsport. I won’t tell you that I mixed up the dates and ended up at midnight with no room at the Inn. 

However the kind lady at Expedia, with an accent I couldn't understand, along with my late night head, and ears filled with the sound of the car's motor,  fixed it, the kind desk lady interpreted, and we did have a bed at a different Motor Lodge.

Oh, I just told you?

Well, all ended well.

I would say if you want to see pretty towns and boutique shops aim North from Eugene, that way you will hit Florence, and Newport Beach, and my favorite Cannon Beach.

We must go further north sometime to Seaside. I was there when I was about 11 years old. I remember lying on the beach with my mother, and it was the first time I had seen the ocean. 

Much has changed since then.

Okay, on to the south.

There is a 40 mile stretch from Florence on down south where sand dunes form.

With Reedsport and Winchester Bay being the heart of dune country.

Oh yes, Winchester Bay is where we stopped for an iced latte’ at a little bakery that served blueberry scones with so much fruit each scone weighed in at about a pound.

The strip of land east of the Cascades is where the big trees reign, and I cherish them, and worry if I see a spindly one. But those southern trees were healthy, abundant and beautiful.

I guess I want people to know that Oregon isn’t all treed, and that our strip west of the Cascades is fragile. 

Here we go

Oh, there you are Miss Beautiful Pacific

 

At Reedsport, we drove down a long “spit.” Yep, it was called that. The spit stretched out alongside the river to the ocean. And there were the sand dunes, being used as ski slopes for the sand dune riders.

I wondered about how the dunes were made and why they were there and knew it was the play of wind but didn’t know much more.

Now I know that sand grains roll and skip, until they meet an immovable object, like a shrub. I read that they can even begin as an ant hill. The sand stacks up until it reaches such a height that it collapses upon itself, forming a windward side and a slip side. This is its angle of repose, where it is stable, usually 30-34 degrees.

Yep, the wind blew. I felt like I had spent the day in a convertible. Once I thought that a convertible would be fun, so we rented a jeep in Hawaii. Wow, talk about feeling beaten up.

Many RVs and campgrounds existed along the spit and even a horse camp where the campgrounds supplied wooden corrals for the horses to allow them free-time off a rope.

I was amazed to see so much water, lakes and ponds sitting right on the sand. How that happened is a mystery to me, but there they were dry sand and wet water. 

This lake was pretty. It reminded me of our estuary (didn’t belong to us, I just claimed it) in Hawaii that existed alongside the ocean at Black Sands Beach, and sported water lilies, and a ducky.

We drove to Bandon, where we had lunch. See our little Sweetpea peeking out from behind Dad’s legs?

In Bandon we saw the greatest chainsaw carving I have ever seen—a T-Rex.

Coming home we drove back to Reedsport and inland through Elton where the magnificent elk grazed right alongside the road, And you could get out and watch them, contented as tame cows.

In The Medicine Cards, by Jamie Sams & David Carson, the elk teaches us that pacing ourselves will increase our stamina. The elk has little defense against a mountain lion except his ability to go the distance.

Elk has a curious kind of warrior energy, for except during mating season, he honors his own sex, and can, therefore, call upon the medicine of brotherhood or sisterhood.

Exploration

If as John Muir said, "Of all the paths we take, make one dirt," does sand count? See The Oregon Coast in the next issue.

Many moons ago—moons?--that is moons times 12 ago,  I walked into freshman Biology class plunked myself down beside a kid that didn’t take notes but got A’s anyway (Don’t you hate those people? No, envy.), I set a notebook on my desk, and wrote on the top of my page the words the professor shouted: “THIS IS THE STUDY OF LIFE!”

Cool!

I want to know about life.

You know how an enthusiastic teacher can motivate you.

This man loved his subject, and I loved it too.

The trouble was that after studying, Kingdom, Class, Order, Genus, species, oh, biologists like to name things—I found that while physical life was spread out before me, there was not much about ethereal life.

The big questions couldn’t be categorized, labeled, pigeonholed, or even addressed in a satisfactory manner. I suppose it is rather like the question put to Alfred Kinsey, the sex study doctor, who, when asked why he didn’t include love into his equation answered, “Because it is not measurable.”

To me, the really interesting questions are ones not measurable.

Apologies to my biology professor, but life is not something in which we can achieve a degree. Life is something we all have, all think about, and all have trouble understanding.

That puts us all on an equal playing field.

Which brings me to my question of why we are so separate from each other?

Why do we fear strangers? Why do we demonize certain segments of our population?

Yes, they look different, act different, have different beliefs. There must be something wrong with them.

Well now, we can explain that evolutionarily.

Think of zebras, deer and other preyed upon animals; all look alike. The odd one gets singled out of the herd. He catches the eye of the predator. Whoops, old Ralph—the Zebra with brown stripes instead of black ones--is gone.

We are like that too. Different is singled out.

Remember when the TV show Star Trek burst upon the scene?

It was the first multiracial show. And on it was the first bi-racial kiss.

The Enterprise was populated with all manner of multiracial and multi-species humanoids. Spock, the hybrid Vulcan with pointie ears and little emotion, was loved. There was an Asian, a Black, a Scotsman, and on top of that all manner of aliens with faces that looked like they had been mashed into a mold.

I wondered at the time how that would change attitudes toward different races.

It took a while.

Think of the wild horse. To be ostracized from the herd is a death sentence. He would be free game for a mountain lion.

A horse will practically break his neck to get back into the herd--the safest place.

We, too, fear being ostracized, and thus we behave in a manner acceptable to the group.

For some native tribes being ostracized was the worst punishment, for alone in the wild, an alone person would surely die.

Thinking back to StarTrek, initially, it ran only for one year, and the network canceled it due to poor ratings.

Talk about an evolutionary come back. That was partly due to a writing campaign from the viewers and encouraged by the promoters.

Oh yeah, think of the flip-open communicator.

 I have one of those sitting on my desk.

It doesn’t beam me up though—not yet.

Science imitating art.

And Nasa named one of the Space Shuttles Enterprise.

Isn’t that phenomenal?

We have come to a place where we are instrumental in our own evolution.

(Oh, and don’t give me any flack for using the word evolution—it means change  over time.)

Evolution is an emotion packed word, for to Creationists it means we came from monkeys.  You can believe we evolved from monkeys, God created us, or the Universe is a perpetual motion machine. It's all up for grabs. However, the idea of beating each other up over an ideology is ludicrous.

A wise man once told me this story: Have I told you this?

We are all princesses or princes under a frog suit. The frog suit has tears showing the princess beneath, and we try to cover up those holes, yet if we ripped off the frog suit it would reveal the true princess.

P.S. Oprah motivated me to begin another blog--not personally, of course, but in leafing through her magazine, I noticed how it was laid out on a page, many pictures, bold headings, change of fonts, ads of course. I have heard that large blocks of type scare people. There are articles in her magazine, but you really have to decide to read them. In that vein, I began another blog, one I could maneuver better than the ones I have. 

When you have the time I would appreciate it if you would check in and tell me what you think of 

travelwithjoyce.com

Thank you ever so much.