Oregon – Page 2 – A Darker View

Oregon in 1986

Another pick from the slides I am busily digitizing. After basic training and tech school with the USAF and before deployment to England, I took a month’s leave. Much of this was spent visiting favorite places around Portland in the late fall of 1986…

Latourell Falls in the Columbia River Gorge

Downtown Portland — The transit mall in downtown Portland

The newly completed MAX line from Gresham stops in downtown Portland

Mt. Hood Sunset — Sunset lights Mt. Hood in pastel shades

Portland Skyline — The Portland skyline at night, at least as it appeared in 1986

A nightime view looking over downtown Portland from Council Crest

Oregon in 1985

More scanning, more memories. Taking these old photos out of the boxes has been fun. So many little treasures on celluloid. Photos of myself as a teenager, photos of the neighborhood I grew up in. There is so much of my life stowed away out of reach, converted to digital they live again…

Middle North Falls in Silver Falls State Park

Silver Creek flows through Silver Falls State Park

Mt. St. Helens in 1985 — The south face Mt. St. Helens a few years after the 1980 eruption with lahars in the foreground

Lahar — A lahar (mudflow) from the lahar viewpoint on Muddy River and forest road 83

The constellation Orion taken with a simple tracking platform and Ektachrome film

Sunset from Bull Mtn — Sunset as seen from from the front porch of my childhood home on Bull Mtn.

Snowy Sunrise Lane — Sunrise Lane covered in a fresh snowfall

Jerry's Barn — Jerry’s old barn across the street from my childhood home

Frost Horse — A horse stands in a frosty winter field

Sand Dollar — A sand dollar on a Pacific Northwest beach

Dune — Storm scattered sands covers beach grass

Strauss

Oregon Star Party 2013

The plan is simple, a vacation combining a visit to my family and a run to Oregon Star Party. I miss doing the larger regional star parties, six telescopes is a big star party on the island. OSP would feature hundreds of telescopes, speakers, and hopefully dark skies. I also volunteered as a speaker, may as well bring and share little Keck experience.

Andrew and the Galaxy — The author taking astrophotos under the Milky Way Galaxy

Heading to a major star party takes some planning. Worse, I would be doing this with what could be packed for airline travel. The answer would be to implement my usual star party plan… Set up for astrophotography, this would allow vising other telescopes while my camera ran under computer control. Good astrophotography can also be done with relatively small equipment.

The site is quite remote, no nearby hardware store to replace a missing bolt, no internet connection to allow download of a missing driver. The setup would have to work with what was packed to start with. Several iterations of packing showed that two cases would be required to carry the setup. An ancient hard suitcase I have had since my Air Force days, and a hard equipment case purchased years ago for a portable telescope I have yet to build. At least both had wheels and could be hauled by one person through an airport terminal.

After a few very nice days visiting with my parents I steal away in the camper for the drive to OSP. Four hours sees me over the Cascades, into the Ochoco Mountains east of Prineville. It is a very pleasant drive, a beautiful day, open roads, Mt. Hood soaring over the trees that line the highway. The sort of driving you just can not do on the island, the sort of vacation I grew up with.

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