Saturday, December 18, 2004


Pop Lake Posted by Hello

posted by Snave at 12:41 PM

1 Comments:

Blogger Snave said...

One thing I didn't mention in my write-up is that NE Oregon is definitely a "red state" area. While La Grande does have the university which tempers the election results somewhat, Bush nonetheless took LG by about 60-40. County-wide it was more like a 2-1 margin. NE Oregon is a lot closer, physically and spiritually, to Idaho than it is to the more liberal parts of the Willamette Valley (Eugene and Portland in particular.)

People are pretty nice here, and although most everyone assumes everyone else is a conservative, we mostly all get along just fine. There are enough of us liberal goofballs around that we can always get together and share our various miseries if we really need to.

You will run in to a number of cowboy/rancher/farmer types in this area who vote GOP mostly because of land use issues, and there are loggers who vote GOP mostly on the environmental issues. This area wasn't settled until about 1860, and that may be part of what causes people in this area to vote GOP also because of gun control issues. Kind of a "survival" mentality for some, I suppose.

Most NE Oregonians are pretty close to the outdoors too, so the gun control thing also comes into play there. I don't hunt, but I have no problem with those who do. I don't own guns, but again, I don't have problems with others owning them. Around here, most people know how to use them safely.

One other thing I should mention is the weather. We have four definite seasons here. Winter weather begins around November 1, and we do get snow. We had four inches of snow which lasted about a week, and lately we've had highs of 45 or 50 and lows of around 25. We will alternately have snow and thaw until around early March, and then it will tend to be rainy for a couple of months with some hints of spring. Usually by May 1 we have temperatures in the 60's. The hills around the area stay nice and green until early-mid June, then things begin to "brown up" and we often get very little rain from late June to mid-September (unless it comes in the form of thunderstorms, which can contribute to forest fires.) Summer temperatures are normally between high 80's to around 100. Late September through late October is one of my favorite times here, as we definitely get nice color in the trees, and the temperatures begin to come down a bit. So I guess I might say we have what I have always thought of as 4 months of winter, 2 months of spring, 4 months of summer, and 2 months of fall.

Plan a trip and have part of your route take you through this area. The Grande Ronde Valley is truly a wonderful place, and I would be happy to provide some travel tips for you.

3:38 PM  

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