Day 6?: Salem, OR

We headed directly to Salem after breakfast since Sally wanted to be sure she was at the conference on time. We drove on a two lane highway that followed the Willamette River south, winding between vineyards and huge fields of trees and flowers. This is a really fertile area.

We arrived in downtown Salem about 11:00 and dropped our bags off at the hotel (very nice). We decided to walk a bit until it was time for Sally's conference to start.

We walked down Liberty Avenue, a main drag, and saw lots of interesting local stores and restaurants. In the middle of downtown we found the Tuesday Farmer's Market where there were stands with beautiful berries (Loganberries, Blueberries, Cherries, etc.) and lots of prepared food.

Then we walked over to the State Capital which was constructed in the 1930s by the WPA. The side of the building looks more like an office building than a traditional state capital but the front has imposing marble walls featuring pithy inscriptions about democracy. There are some huge statues in the front showing pioneers doing pioneer things. There are a number of huge murals inside the capital that show Oregonians working together (e.g., farmers and cowboys working together).

We wandered over to Willamette University where Sally conference is being held. It's a pretty campus. At that point I took off.

I wandered around downtown a bit more. Amazingly, there is only one chain store in the whole downtown. Yes, it's Starbucks. Luckily there are two coffee shops within a block of Starbucks and they're both busy.

I headed east intending to go to Silver Falls, a well-known state park in the area. After I had driven for a few minutes I decided to drive past the turn for the park and continue east into the Cascades to try to get a glimpse of Mount Jefferson, a pretty big volcanoe that is due east of Salem. I got the glimpse pretty quickly as Jefferson appeared above the foothills when I had gone about 20 miles.

Satisfied, I turned back and drove to Silver Falls. The park is really beautiful. It's a long wooded canyon with high waterfalls (170 ft, 211 ft) at either end. It's a rainforest area so it's very green, cool, and moist.

It is a very popular park so there are huge parking areas and very gentle trails to allow maximum access. There's no extreme hiking at this park.

I returned to Salem and had some Chinese food at a pretty good place. I hung out at the Coffee House Cafe until nine when I went back to the hotel to meet Sally.