Now For A Little Sight Seeing

Cindy Barganier Interiors / Market & Travel  / Now For A Little Sight Seeing

Now For A Little Sight Seeing

After  a couple of days fishing we headed off to see what this beautiful part of the world had to offer. My friend, Linda Ford, told me that we had to eat at “the restaurant in Medford’s old depot” so after a little detective work we made reservations for dinner at Porter’s Train Station  Restaurant and Bar and we are glad that we did. What a beautifully restored old building with ivy gracefully climbing its facade.

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The theme here is decidedly “train” but tastefully done. You can choose from several dining spaces:

curtained booths reminiscent of the old dining cars that used to pull into the depot to pick up and let off passengers

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a lovely walled courtyard with party lights and umbrellas

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or the two story bar.

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Wherever you decide to sit you can be assured that the food will be wonderful.

We started off with a salad of fresh Oregon organic greens topped with glazed walnuts, Rogue River Creamery blue cheese and a homemade blackberry vinaigrette dressing. Delish

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This was followed by our first ever hazelnut encrusted steelhead served on a bed on steamed spinach. Not my cute little half-pounder that likes Hebrew ( see former post) but just a plain ole generic steelhead and it was fantastic.

The manager even sent over a bottle of local wine.

If you are ever in Medford, Oregon check them out and tell them we sent you!

Early Saturday morning we set out for Crater Lake National Park about an hour away.

Breath taking. The lake was formed when a volcano erupted and then imploded creating a basin that was then filled with run-off and melted snow . The average snowfall at Crater Lake is 533 inches every year. That’s about 44 feet! That’s a LOT of snow to a southern girl. They say that if you go at Christmas you are actually snowshoeing in the tops of the trees. Wow! Its depth of 1,943 feet (592 meters) makes it the deepest lake in the United States, and the seventh deepest in the world. Its fresh water is some of the clearest found anywhere in the world. Indeed it looks like the Mediterranean’s water and the mountains are as close to Switzerland as I have seen in this country.


It was very desert like around the crater.

And the ground was filled with these little red flowers whose dried leaves made an eerie sound that one family near us mistook for a rattlesnake.

You can drive around the entire perimeter which takes about 3 hours, or you can take a trolley (which I highly recommend since the road is so narrow and winding with sheer bluffs on the side that the driver cannot takes his/her eye off the road for a second)

These cute little ground squirrels were everywhere. No, they were not chipmunks.

You can also take a boat ride to the two islands located in the center of the lake but prepare for that with hats and sunscreen. That’s about a two-hour ride and the boat is open.

When you get to the tip top you are rewarded with one of the most award worthy architectural feats around: a remarkable stone and cedar lodge literally perched on the very edge of the crater. Even after watching the videos showing them building it, it was difficult for me to wrap my head around how it was even possible.

You know I’m going to love it when I walk inside and find a walk-in stone fireplace with roaring fire and real bark covering the staircase.  This was craftsmanship at its best.

One day, if I can gather any information on it, I will have to dedicate a post to its construction.

Across the entire back, just outside the restaurant where I had the best salad and clam chowder of the trip was this veranda.

 

From here one can begin to grasp the size of this lake but as I review these pictures I realize again that you just cannot capture it on film.

Tomorrow, we head to the Redwood Forest!

If you would like to say, ‘That was fun!” at the end of your project contact us at

www.cindybarganier.com.

 

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4 Comments
  • Such a beautiful place, Cindy! I know that you and Jeff enjoyed every minute. The fireplace is perfect!
    Thank you for sharing. More info on the hazelnut crust, please.
    Happy Wednesday.
    Teresa
    xoxo

    October 17, 2012 at 12:39 pm
  • Rachel Plummer
    Reply

    I don’t think I like you very much anymore! I am so jealous and you look about 25 I’m these pics! You go, Gigi!

    October 17, 2012 at 5:21 pm

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