Ducks @ Oregon - University of Oregon

Trifecta of Field Trips

Trafton B.

January 18, 2010 - 10:22 PM

There is only word to describe my weekend.

Epic.

MLK should have his birthday more often, because I love celebrating it. This weekend my friends and I traveled just about everywhere within a sixty mile radius of Eugene to take advantage of Oregon's ample outdoor adventures. Not to mention, I checked three places off of my "places to see before I graduate list."

West Eugene Wetlands. Friday afternoon, I hopped on the EmX - Eugene bus rapid transit. - with my Environmental Leadership class and headed down W 11th Street to the West Eugene Wetlands to meet with Jules Abbott, Environmental Ed Specialist for the Willamette Resources and Educational Network (WREN). To give some background, just like my Climate Equity ELP team is working with Partnership for Sustainable Schools, the Wetlands ELP team is working with WREN to educate local schools about the delicate and bio-diverse wetlands ecosystem. So, our field trip was to, first, familiarize ourselves with the wetland area and, second, to start gaining some experience in environmental education.

In essence, the six or seven ELP students present acted as if we were a middle school class on a field trip to the wetlands, while Jules and Carrie (Environmental Ed Assistant at WREN) lead us through a normal day's worth of lessons. We talked about the unique biotic and abiotic factors of all wetlands, and that wetlands act as carbon sinks. And then Jules and Carrie told us the special educator tricks that they were using to encourage participation and make the experience more memorable for the student. That was probably my favorite part. Except I was pretty jealous of Carrie's handkerchief with a real size guide to animal "scat." I might have to get my hands on one of those. The handkerchief, not the scat.

Terwilliger Hot Springs at Cougar Reservoir. The next stop on the weekend wilderness parade was the hot springs about an hour and a half east of Eugene. Kind of a trek, but definitely worth it. Cougar Reservoir is an absolutely stunning valley, and aside from the miscellaneous machinery and buoys around the water, it couldn't have looked more perfect that day. Check out the picture of my roommate, Cam, in the gray hoody to see for yourselves. Again, epic.

A quarter mile walk through the woods brought us to the main attraction, which was the four manmade yet, very rustic looking sulfur pools. When I was thinking hot springs, I was thinking a few muddy holes in the ground that we may or may not be able to get our entire bodies in, but boy was I mistaken. These were superb, albeit slightly over filled, especially considering that in the wintertime only the top two pools stay comfortably warm.

I would share pictures with you but I obviously couldn't bring the camera near the water, and well, let's just say there we several people that took to the "Clothing Optional" rule very liberally. We found out from George, whom everyone referred to as "The Mayor" of the hot springs, that these were the finest and most well known hot springs in the Pacific Northwest. Not too shabby. So with that said, I highly recommend visiting sometime in your life, but fair warning about the usual crowd.

Honeyman Memorial State Park. Last but not least, Sunday night we drove over to Florence to camp in yurts on the Oregon coast, another place I am kicking myself for never having visited. Arriving in the afternoon to bounce around town for a bit, checking out the antique stores and taking in the sea breeze, and then dropping our things off at the yurts before eating at Mo's Seafood for dinner. I'm a sucker for a good plate of fish and chips, so as you can imagine I was in heaven.

There were a lot memorable moments had inside the yurt last night, and I'll try to paint a picture for you. There was dancing and playing American Pie on the guitar while stuggling to remember the words outside of the chorus. There were campfire games like Zumi-Zumi and Big Booty and a thunderstorm that left us without lights for part of the evening.

We were a total of about twenty people in two yurts made to sleep five comfortably according to the website. We found out quickly why they included ‘comfortably' in the description. We all fit in there, but very few of us enjoyed a full night's rest. However, that may have something to do with the fifteen ATVs that started revving their engines at 7AM. Ironically, those engines became white noise for me after a while, but the kid with his toy RC monster truck ticked me off the most. We didn't really consider how close our campsite was to the dunes, so our crummy sleep was outdone by quite possibly the rudest awakening I've ever experienced.

Now, it's back to the books. And having enjoyed my weekend to the fullest, I have quite a bit of catching up to do. Lucky for me, long weekends lead into short weeks so I should be in good shape. This weekend was pretty much the calm before the storm, as far as coursework goes. My first midterm is one week from today. Yikes! O well. Work hard, play hard. That's my motto and it hasn't let down yet.

Cheers