View from behind the RV towards the foot hills of the Chehelam Mountains

We've worked hard last week at clearing the back fence, at what is going to be our future site, off the jungle of blackberries and ivy that had overgrown it in the last 10 years or so.

In addition, James and Dan cut down 3 trees as well, which had died due to being strangled by Ivy .

They used Dan's little tractor to reach about halfway so James could cut most of the limbs off first, after which he proceeded to cut the trees in half before felling them completely ..

All went well and the trees fell exactly where they were supposed to .. always a little tricky to do but James did a great job!

We're still hacking away at the blackberries and ivy but we're slowly recovering the fence and are gaining a little more view of the hills behind it.

This picture shows the view a week ago :

Which as you can see was non-existent, and this next one shows it now:

We still need to clear more ivy from the top of the fence and we might even cut down the fence a little bit, or at least cut a few openings in it, so we have a view when we sit down on our future porch as well.
It's a slow process but we have time, and due to the extreme warm weather of the moment we're limiting ourselves to about 2 hours early in the morning when it's still cool.

I forgot to show a few other projects we did last week as well, like cutting the hedge:

And installing a new light outside the barn that hasn't worked in years and that had been on the 'honey-do' list for a while.
Dan is getting a little more apprehensive of working that high on a ladder so it was a project that they really appreciated to finally have done.

   

It comes on at dusk and turns of at dawn and besides making it easier to back the car in when it's dark, it hopefully also acts as a deterrent for anybody or any animals to creep around in the night ...

For something fun to do this week we accompanied Dan and Cindy to a cherry orchard they go to every year in Dundee, which is only about 15 minutes from here.
Miller Farm Cherries is a small, seasonal u-pick cherry orchard and cherries are only $1.50/pound.
You better get there right when the season opens because they go fast!

                       

   

We decide to go early and were the first ones there at 8.00 am on opening day! Look at these gorgeous dark-red cherries!

                                                     

And although there were some trees that were practically laden with fruit the he owner told us that they're having a very bad year, the reason being that there are no bees!
Some of these cherries are self-pollinating but most others need bees and they are in short numbers these days.
Human activities like large-scale changes in land use, industrialised agricultural practices, like monocultures, and the detrimental use of pesticides have all contributed to destroying their habitats and reducing their available food sources.
It's a big problem and quite worrisome for the future of many of our crops ..

Nevertheless, we managed to pick a lot, as in 14.5 pounds in only half an hour!
We'd set a limit before going out because I have only so much freezer space, but it was very easy picking and hard not to keep going seeing all this gorgeous fruit!
(Dan and Cindy picked a lot more, as in 61 pounds, but they have a dehydrator and dry most of it).

And than after bringing our loot home of course the real work started!
After washing them thoroughly we set up a 'pit-removal station' in our back yard, borrowed two simple but very effective pitter-tools from Dan and Cindy, donned some gloves and got to work:

It took us only an hour to get them all done! I separated them into 6 baggies with 4 cups each, and into the freezer they went!

I see a lot of cherry pie, cherry cobbler and crisp, cherry sauce and cherry preserves .. just to name a few .. in the future!

Talking about food .. the other day, after we measured some houses (we now go out as a team for appraisals, at least for the measuring part of it) we decided to drop in for lunch at Alf's in McMinnville.

This historic hamburger and ice cream shack straight out of the 1950's used to have a drive through but now only serves from the diner itself. 

Their hamburgers and ice-cream is home-made and their prices are reasonable.

                                                                                   

It's a little bit of tasty nostalgia with good food and a 50's atmosphere with 50s decor and 50s music!

                                     

There used to be a monkey in a cage but I guess he retired a couple of years ago.

His name was Elvis and the joint is kind of named after him .. Alf (Elv)'s(is) ..

The garden 20 years ago, when it still had a good view of the city!

Last Wednesday we decided to take a break from all the working and organizing and planning of lately and go for a little road-trip.
We'd talked about re-visiting Portland's rose-garden, where we'd last been about 20 years ago, and since it was a beautiful sunny day we went for it.
The International Rose Test Garden is a rose garden in Washington Park in Portland, Oregon, right next to the Japanese Garden and the Zoo.



There are over 10,000 rose bushes of approximately 650 varieties and they bloom from April through October with the peak in June, depending on the weather.

   

New rose cultivars are continually sent to the garden from many parts of the world and are evaluated on several characteristics, including disease resistance, bloom formation, color, and fragrance.



Portland's nickname is 'City of Roses’ and the garden is it's signature landmark.

It is the oldest continuously operating public rose test garden in the United States and draws an estimated 700,000 visitors annually.

The garden is situated on a hill above the city and parking close by can be an issue, since there are not that many spaces available. We planned to be there quite early, around 9.30, which was a good thing because we snatched up the very last one!

The entrance is free but you pay $2/2hrs to park, which is unheard of for Portland!

Well, we definitely managed to hit the garden at it's peak bloom! 

Pretty much all the roses were blooming which made for an absolutely stunning view down the hill and over all the flowerbeds that were just bursting with colors!

It took us about 2 hours to leisurely stroll the meandering paths, taking in all the sights and especially all the smells!

These last ones were some of my favorites, with their yellow buds that turned into orange/pink flowers!

We'd brought some coffee and cookies and found a sunny spot to sit down. The weather was beautiful, but this early in the morning it was still somewhat cool in the shade :

  

Closely watched by a whole bunch of, rather tame, ground-squirrels ... they were happily munching on some juicy new shoots but they were eyeing our cookies ...

                                                

We walked the steps down to the end of the garden and than back up again to the top from where you can overlook the whole garden and from where you used to have a view over the city (like the picture at the top of this post, which I stole from the web).
In the 20 years we hadn't been there the trees had definitely grown and nowadays you only have a few little peaks of the city in the far distance :

By than it had warmed up considerably, and we sat down again for a while for some more coffee on one of the benches where you can overlook the whole garden.

We watched quite a lot of groups of volunteers (mostly women) who were deadheading and pruning. I guess a garden like this can use some help in peak-season!

      

It's hard to stop making pictures when there's this much beauty around every corner!

                          

We debated going into Portland for some more sight-seeing and lunch but we'd had such a nice, peaceful and relaxed morning that we just didn't feel like having to deal with traffic or people or parking so we drove back towards Newberg and stopped for lunch at Sophia's Cafe in Sherwood instead.

This little Mediterranean restaurant, that offers Greek and Lebanese meals, had been on our radar for a while but we'd just never made it there ..yet.
We ordered a lamb gyro plate and fried vegetables with hummus and fries:

It was delicious! We'll be back!

And that's all she wrote for this week I'm afraid, not much else going on ..
We're still waiting on the permit from the county to come through, so we can move to our permanent spot, and are doing some daily weeding, mowing and pruning of the site.
I can't wait to settle in properly with everything hooked up and in it's permanent place. For now it feels like we're still sort of camping and might (have to) move any day.

We're keeping our fingers crossed. Hopefully we hear something soon!

 

This is the best picture I could get of one of the two young robins I spotted in their pretty little nest in the maple trees behind the barn.
Their parents are flying on and off feeding the hungry little tykes .. except when I take position behind the nearby shrubs to take a picture. I can wait till I'm blue in the face, or more accurate until my arms cramp up, but they won't come near the nest as long as I'm there!

We're having beautiful weather, not too hot and not too cold, and if it was up to me I'd keep it like this all summer long!
The vegetable garden of our landlords is going gangbusters, we've been told to pick up the pace eating lettuce, asparagus and snow-peas since they're growing like crazy.
We're happy to comply!

Their arbor at the driveway, which was completely covered with that beautiful Wisteria a couple of weeks ago, is now sporting two beautiful varieties of different roses:

                                                          

(And it looks like that Wisteria is having a second bloom as well!)

      

James has been working hard on several appraisals this week and I have accompanied him when he went out to measure them one day.
It's a lot easier to do with two people, one calling out the numbers and one writing them down and creating a drawing, although things got a lot easier with the introduction of lasers a couple of years ago which has eliminated the fumbling around with a tape-measurer!

On Thursday and Friday he helped Dan (our landlord) to tackle one of his 'projects' for our rent-barter.
They painted the new pump-house (they're on a well) the same color as their house.

It had been partly primed but that's as far as Dan got and he sure appreciated James' help in finally getting it done!
Just like with measuring for an appraisal, it's a lot easier and faster with two and of course James has all the necessary tools which helps a lot as well!

I've been tackling a few other projects. One of them being the 'saving' of the grapes!
During our first visit to the property in May all that was visible of said grapes was that patch of brown, dead looking branches there on the foreground.
They used to grow over an old arbor that had slowly deteriorated and this winter it had finally given up the ghost and collapsed ...

                                   

When we arrived a couple of weeks later, this had happened!

    

                         

Not only had the vines started to send out new shoots but half of the leaves belong to ... blackberries! Vigorous, nasty, mean old blackberries!

Dan thought there where 6 different vines under the whole mess but exactly where they were was anybody's guess ..

Needless to say, it wasn't a very fun job to untangle the whole mess and figure out what was what and what to cut or save or lead whichever way ..
Many hours, bloody scratches and a lot of cursing later I finally got it done. It was unavoidable that some of the new growth was lost due to the tangles but at least now the rest has a chance.

Who knows, we might even get some grapes!
(These are table-grapes by the way)

Mowing the grass is a weekly occurrence in the spring, and we've taken responsibilty for about an acre of it, but since we haven't had much rain, and that particular area is not being watered, it's already starting to turn brown so we can slow down at that chore.
Which is nice, since this meadow is a little bit of a mine-field right now.
Compliments of this little dude .. well, little .. it's actually quite a hefty guy, for a gopher!



Talking about our barter for rent, we've agreed on 10 hours (between the two of us) per week but since there won't be as much to do in the winter we'll be doubling up on them over the summer when most maintenance as well as any special projects will be done.
Of course it's a new situation for both of us and we'll see how it works out.
We've made lists of things to be done and we confer almost daily about who is doing what or who needs help with anything and I think as long as we keep communicating and expressing what we like or not or what could or should go different, we'll be just fine!

Time will tell, but so far so good!