A very lonely Clydesdale

Today I stopped on the side of the road to take some pictures of the mountains and this one lonely Clydesdale horse that I drive by all the time.

What I wanted was to take of picture of was this lonely horse looking off into the grey, cloudy mountains. So I started taking pictures of the mountains, working my way to towards the horse.

From Enterprise

All of the sudden the horse turns around and starts walking towards me! I'm thinking-NO! you're ruining my shot horse! Go back to the one place you are always standing in when I drive by!

From Enterprise

Of course I soon realize that the shot I had in my mind was only possible it I was 7 feet tall...so she (he?) isn't really ruining my shot-ah the drawbacks to being vertically challenged!

I couldn't believe it-this huge Clydesdale horse is walking right up to me to say hi! I felt so bad I didn't have any snacks to give her!

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She (I've decided it's a girl!) was so beautiful!!

From Enterprise

From Enterprise

I was just so happy to have this experience and to feel so small next to this big beautiful horse-it made my day!

The Snowy Mountains

Well the clouds have finally let go of the mountains for a little bit and we get to see the aftermath of a long, cold and snowy weekend and the results are beautiful!

Here is the view looking back at Wallowa Lake

From Enterprise

And Chief Joseph Mountain and the Lake

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The Seven Devils mountains in the distance

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I'm sure Keith's knows which mountains these are, but I don't!

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Hopefully I'll have time to get some better pictures soon but I have to get back to doing homework!

A winter wonderland in October

After yesterday, I was kind of scared to wake up this morning and look outside.

Yesterday we woke up to a light dusting of snow on the ground, but it was in the 40s and raining-just as predicted. When we got back from the gym is was starting to snow, but it wasn't really sticking and there wasn't much accumulation. Slowly but surely then snow started to accumulate more and more.....

From Enterprise

From Enterprise

By the evening we were kind of seriously worried about losing power since this snow is SO wet and heavy...luckily we didn't, but upon waking up this morning I'm kind of surprised we didn't! These pictures are from the road to our little cabin. Downtown Joseph almost looks like a bomb went off with the number of trees and branches down (sorry no pics, it was barely above freezing and raining..I wasn't about to get out of the warm car!)

From Enterprise

From Enterprise

As I am sitting in the Sip and Surf I have heard that not only that there is an 80% of more snow tonight but also that a bunch of people did lose power up here on the lake-we did get lucky. I would also like to say that on Monday it was hot and beautiful 87 degrees here!!

Hopefully I'll be posting beautiful pictures of all the snowy mountains soon... but so far the clouds haven't let go of the mountains yet-yet!

BJ and the Deer

BJ and I just had to go outside and play in all of this crazy snow (more about that later!). I was planning on just taking pictures of the cabin and everything covered in snow when I looked to my left and there were 8 deer!! Since none of them had antlers I'm guessing that it was 6 females and 2 babies (Bambi!)

At first BJ was just running around in the snow being his usual oblivious self, but all the deer were watching him intently.

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I could tell these deer were really curious about BJ, but I was shocked when one of them decided to approach BJ!

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Of course BJ is still oblivious....but not for long!

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And then another one came up to say hi.

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In all three of the deer came up to check out BJ-and of course he barked at all of them-and they didn't seem to be fazed by him and all his loudness at all!

I don't think he would have ever had this experience if we were still in Portland!

Big Sheep Ridge Wildland Fire

Yesterday, walking out of the library I saw this:

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Whoa! I had no idea there was a giant wildfire raging in the mountains! Of course I had to drive around the county side and take pictures-and almost be late for class!

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From Enterprise

Thanks Smokey the Bear!

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Life on the Lake

After a little over a month of incredible hospitality from Craig and Renee, it is time for our little clan to move on and out to our own place for the next few weeks.

With Renee's help, we are now staying at a little cabin on Wallowa Lake for the rest of our time here in Enterprise! That means no more pictures of the chickens and horses and probably a lot of pictures of deer and the lake-not a bad trade!

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Here is our living room, dining room, kitchen, and study:

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From Enterprise

Luckily most tourists are starting to clear out of this area, so it looks like this may be the majority of our neighbors for the remaining couple of weeks-which of course BJ can not stop barking at!

From Enterprise

I apologize if anyone got emailed a draft of this...while I was typing BJ jumped on my lap and hit send!

Party, party, party!

What a week! Not only did I have my birthday but Keith and I have had not one, not two, but three parties to go to this week-and one is being thrown just for us!

On the big ole' 3-0 we had the clinic BBQ to go to, which of course we were late to because I had archives class and was dying to get out of it the whole time! I was very surprised that right when we walked in to Liz and Nic's candles were lit on a birthday cake for me, even though almost no one there even knew me!

Then on Thursday evening we were thrown a community (recruiting) party at the Fish Trap house. Liz and Kathleen planned the party, down to hand picking who were invited. I'd say the best part of this (besides the pizza and beer) was that the about 20 people who came all sat around and told us all their favorite parts of living in Wallowa County and how much they would love us to come there to stay. I'm not sure if any where we go after this will be able to compete with what was referred to as the Holy Trinity of Wallowa County: the mountains, the community and Terminal Gravity beer!

On Saturday we went to the benefit for the hospital. It was an auction and dinner and Keith and I were among the very few younger people there. Keith said that he had never seen so many people he had seen in clinic in one place before. We were seated at a table with the Wallowa County District Attorney and her husband and family as well as Ann Hayes-who I had interviewed on the phone a few weeks before for an assignment but hadn't met in person before. The best part was that I got to dress up and wear my new necklace!

Well I don't think we have any more parties to go to since we're only going to be here for a couple more weeks... but this past week was a lot of fun!