Best Day Ever

Sorry for the lack of blog entries lately. The intensity of farm work at Rainshadow Organics, the third farm, and lack of electrify at Cloudplay have made it rather difficult. But better late than never, right?

After spending 10 days pruning trees, pulling young Douglas Firs, splitting firewood, doing dishes, expanding the garden, weeding the garden, watering the garden and just about anything to help at Cloudplay, our host decided that our last day would be a treat. This entry is about that day. The Best Day Ever.

The day began just as any Best Day Ever should begin, we got to sleep in. After a quick breakfast, we were off to our first stop: Secret Beach. Although our host assured us that this was his favorite beach on the Oregon coast (a coast famous for its beautiful rocky beaches), the unmarked highway pull off with only enough space for three cars gave us no indication of why. But that is why it is Secret Beach. Now some of the views here have commanded my attention in a “Look at how pretty I am” type of way, but after a ten minute walk through the forest, my initial view of the beach smacked me in the face with a “I AM SO AWESOME, LOOK AT HOW FLIPPIN BEAUTIFUL I AM” type of way. After about an hour of playing in the waves, watching seals and hanging out at the Secret Beach, we left for our next stop: Fort Dick, CA for Ocean Air Farm’s Shindig.




 










         It is a little strange to be a WWOOFer at a farm and then on our time away from the farm, visit another farm. But this Shindig was worth the return to farm life. As a chance to connect with the local community, Ocean Air Farms invites the pubic onto their farm so that people can see how their produce grows. They had hay rides, sheep shearing demonstrations, live authentic folksy, farm music and even a giant zucchini slingshot (although we left before the flying zucchinis). But the highlight of the event was definitely the 2 o’clock lunch: garden fresh salad, garden fresh potato salad, garden fresh beet and carrot slaw, fresh bread, fresh goat cheese, fresh ham from their pigs and fresh over-night roast beef. The food was pretty fresh. I had seconds. They had dessert. I had seconds on dessert. There was no need for dinner on the Best Day Ever
      Our final stop was the Northern Californian Redwoods. Apparently the largest tree in the world (think about how many trees are in the world, and the very largest one) is located in the county where we went.* If you have not seen the Redwoods, just imagine the tallest tree you have even seen, then multiply that by ten. If you can picture that tree, then your imaginary tree still is not big enough because you cannot imagine trees this big. Here are some pictures to help where my words fall short.

      We made a quick stop on the way home to watch the sun set over the Pacific. Then, after being gone all day, we finally returned and ate ice cream by the moonlight, which was so bright just a night after the full moon that we could see colors. That day fully encompassed our time at Cloudplay: beautiful Oregon coasts, great food and gigantic old growth forests. It was the Best Day Ever.



*They will not disclose which tree is actually the largest due to concerns of people taking souvenirs and damaging the tree.