We gather no moss....


Oregon is beautiful! The weather is glorious, and the place is mossy! Not surprisingly for a famously rainy state, moss grows everywhere. (It is so rainy* that the visitor center at the one of the waterfalls we visited had a rack-full of loaner umbrellas for unprepared tourists)

The waterfalls grow moss.


The trees fill with water, and they grow moss.
(Love that M.C. Escher reflection!)


The trees' moss grows ferns.


The fence posts grow moss.


The bridges grow moss.


If you scratch a drawing of a rose on a rock,
the drawing will grow moss.


The moss grows moss.


The muppet-like forest monsters grow moss.


We were responsible hikers,
and did not gather any of this moss, or anything else.


We just took our time,
and enjoyed every single minute of the waterfalls.


And the spring wildflowers.


And what about the imaginary letterboxing friends that we hung out tonight? We were too busy socializing to shoot off any pictures. Hopefully tomorrow we will remedy this?


* If you hung around with my circle of friends in Maryland, the only correct way to complete this phrase would be the following.
"It is so rainy in Oregon..."
"How rainy is it?"
"It is so rainy, that you have to run around in the shower to get wet."
Does this make sense? Not really. But I've been telling variations on this so-called joke for decades. Thank you, Leo Prahinski.

Comments

Ryan said…
Love the gorge... love the gorge.... Glad you guys could make it out there, but I forgive you if you didn't look for any of my letterboxes there. They're probably a bit much for Robb!

As for rain--it's not really that bad. It only rains about once per year. Just happens to last six months. ;o)

Just kidding. But there's another joke! What do you call the day after two days of rain? Monday! Hahaha! =) Love the rain. Become one with the rain.
Gina said…
Looks as if you're having a great time. What a beautiful spot -- one even might say moss excellent! (And well-deserved. . . )

Enjoy, enjoy!

How was the plane ride?
Anonymous said…
You're maing me miss the northwest!! I hope the plane flight went well and that you're having fun!

leslie
Anonymous said…
Your Maryland joke would rather begin like this-

"Hey Hon, it's so rainy in Oregon..."

Your white springtime flower is called a Trillium, we have them all over the place in Michigan, the blossom would be a bit bigger, and they come in white, pale pink and pale purple. Also, they are the Michigan state flower and it is illegal to pick them.

I found this out the hard way when some nefarious woman I did landscaping for sent me over to her neighbors to "borrow" some of these plants- she assured me she had gotten permission from the actual property owners to do this. Needless to say, the cops I met an hour later thought running me into jail for "protected flower napping" was a welcome sort of crime, varying their investigations from abandonded house burnings that still plague Detroit. Lucky for the police, I let them off with a warning, its not healthy for anyone to disturb my landscaping mania.

Even my almost-criminal relationship with plants would not have kept me from trying to gather some moss in Oregon, I have no resistance when the plants call to me to liberate them from their earth-bound existance.

Annalisa
Great photos! I KNEW bigfoot was real (or almost, anyway). We have (and by "have" I mean "had," as I haven't lived there permanently in five or so years) trillium in Idaho, too. I was told growing up that if you picked one, it took seven years for it to grow back. This is, strangely enough, the same amount of time it supposedly takes for chewing gum to get through your digestive system. I think it's parent shorthand for DON'T DO THAT! Anyway, beautiful flowers, nonetheless.

Look forward to hearing how your trip went, and hearing that you fell in love with the city, and that the local theatre offered you jobs with fatty salaries and you'll be moving up there about the same time as us!

Hasta!
Anonymous said…
Great pictures. Hope the flying part went well!
Lisa said…
I actually have a trillium letterbox in New York! I think the damage is done when the leaves are picked, not the flowers. (More on this, later...)
Troop 2440 said…
I love the moss monster! Absolutely fabulous. I'm looking forward to hearing how the travel part of your trip went.

xo,
Martha

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