A Very Full Day

 We walked to a close restaurant, the Oak Tree, for breakfast.

Egg and waffles

After breakfast, Nathan and I did a little more planning for our My Alpine Tour. We did not need to be in Medford until 10 am for a No Kings protest.  We headed out at 9:30 am  There were already a lot of people gathered by the time we got there.  The news reported that there were over 3,000 people there.  There were people on both sides of the road for about 1/2 mile.  It was peaceful, with some chanting, and a lot of honking horns from the cars driving by. It felt good to be there. While we were out we heard from Rebecca that our power had gone out at home.  A squirrel got zapped on a transformer.  6 homes were affected.  They got it fixed promptly.  

We left the crowd around 11:30 am to head back to Ashland.  We had a 1 pm reservation for an Escape Room event and we needed lunch first. We found a place to park and paid for 3 hours.

We did not have a lot of time so we chose something quick.  I had a tuna bowl.  It was quite tasty. George had grilled cheese and salad, and Nathan had a salmon quesadilla.

We got to the Escape Room just in time.  Anna met us.  She was our guide. It was a Scottish play.  We had to lift the Macbeth curse in 1 hour (not supposed to say M____).  I am afraid to say it but we needed some hints from our guide.  The first room opened up  to other rooms as we solved the puzzles. 

Whew.  It only took us an hour and a half to escape.  Since there was no one scheduled after us, Anna didn't kick us out.  It was fun.  One room had a few technical difficulties which Anna had to come in to fix. She was an enjoyable guide.  

The deer are everywhere. They are not afraid of people.

Ice cream time!!! We needed to recover after our escaping challenges.

We decided to leave the car where it was and just explore Ashland more, so we extended the time to 11:50 pm.  We headed off to find a place for wine tasting.  

Resistance Wine Company.

I had a Sauvignon Blanc and Nathan had a Collab (Chenin Blanc).  I had never heard of that.  It was tasty but I preferred mine.  George got a coke.  We sat and played a game of 10, 9, 8.  

More exploring.

Nathan was brave enough to try the Lithia water.  I had tasted it before.  Never again.

We wandered through the Saturday Art Fair.  A lot of fun art.

We wandered through the park until we found a table to sit at.

It was a little early to go to dinner so, you guessed it, we played another round of 10, 9, 8.

For dinner we picked the Brickroom. We wanted one of the creekside restaurants. 

George had a stir-fry and Nathan and I shared some appetizers.

Beet Salad

SPICY green beans, VERY SPICY. 

Roasted cauliflower.

The cauliflower and beets were very good as was my Sauvignon Blanc (from New Zealand).  

We got to the Green Stage in time for the 6:30 pm show. We found a place to sit.  Nathan went back to the car to get some of our warmer clothes.

Very enjoyable performance. 

A lot of dancing with the music.

Then it was time to go to our next play, Into the Woods.

I saw one of the actors from the night before.  He was going to see the same play.

We had a chance to congratulate him.

This theater was an open air theater. You could rent pillows and blankets.  The chairs were quite uncomfortable, but we did not rent either. 

No photography after the play started.  It was a fun, wacky musical.   It wove together several fairy tales to help the baker and his wife lift the curse that made them childless (Cinderella, Rapunzel, Jack and the Beanstalk, and the Little Red Riding Hood). It had one intermission.  

Whew.  What a full, fun day.  We were back to the motel a little after 11 pm.  

To Ashland

 George, Nathan, and I decided to go to Ashland for the weekend to see a couple of plays. We signed up for 'The Importance of Being Earnest' by Oscar Wilde and 'Into The Woods'.  Nathan drove so that we could leave my car with Rebecca.  Nathan and George picked me up at 1 pm when my shift at the Viva Village office was over.  I was surprised at how heavy the traffic was getting out of Portland in the middle of the day.  I had a zoom meeting with Viva Village which I was able to listen in on.  We made a couple of rest stops. 

Mt McLaughlin

Table Rock

It was a gorgeous day with beautiful scenery. We got to the Relax Inn at 6:05 pm.  We got checked in.

The little blue car is Nathan's.  We are parked right in front of our rooms (11 and 12). George and I got room 11.  We just dropped off our stuff and then drove into Ashland proper. The challenge was to find a parking spot.  Friday night was a very busy night in Ashland. We did find a parking spot a few blocks away from the Angus Bowmer Theatre.  The first stop was to find a restaurant which would be quick. It was nearly 6:45 pm.  The play did not start until 8 pm.  

Walking through Lithia Park

We found Myrtolli's, hand-tossed pizza by the slice. Perfect.

There were a lot of familiar faces in this mural: Janis Joplin, Mick Jagger, Jimmy Hendrix, ... Nathan recognized more of the singers than I did.

We sat under the big hand.

We each had a slice of vegetarian pizza with a salad.  We each chose a different salad. It was delicious and hit the spot.  I was hungry.

We then went to the theater.

  

They were setting up the stage in front for some act on the green stage but we couldn't stay to watch it, or maybe we missed it.

Once we got into the theater Nathan and I ordered some wine.  I had mine in a reusable sippy cup (which I had to purchase) so that I could take it in with me.  We saw that a lot of people brought their own sippy cups to reuse them.  I can use mine again tomorrow. 

We were in the very back row of the theater but luckily it was not a huge theater.  We saw 'The Importance of Being Earnest'

Wow!! What a fabulous performance.  It was an extremely well done hilarious 'comedy of manners'.  They had 2 intermissions, so that they could do the scene changes.  As we were leaving the theater we heard a couple say that they were going to see the same play the following weekend at the Portland Center Stage.  It was after 11 pm by the time that we got back to the motel.