The Oregon Coast

Well, we finally did it.

After 2 months of being in Oregon and spending approximately 5 Mondays in a row explaining to Jeff why we didn't do any of the things we planned to do over the weekend, we finally visited the Oregon coast.

And honestly, just like Silver Falls, words cannot describe how beautiful it was.

Having grown up in a suburb of Houston that is a little of 20 minutes from Galveston Island, I'm definitely no stranger to the beach. For Tracy however, growing up in northern Wisconsin, meant that this was his first time to see the beach. And what a beach to see.

Jeff told us that what's mesmerizing about the Oregon coast was how the forest literally meets the water and he was dead on. Driving on the 101, to our left we saw Fur tree forests and to the right was nothing but gorgeous blue water.

Our itinerary included driving to Newport, OR and Depot bay. We visited the Hatfield Marine Science Center, ate at the Original Mo's and definitely played on the beach.

So without further ado, I'll leave you with the snapshots that my Blackberry took of the day, which for a camera phone, are pretty sweet!

Scotch Broom

Today after Jeff headed our request to tackle something other than Blackberry, we moved to the fields down below the Oak grove to remove some Scotch Broom*, yet another non-native invasive species.

Even though my back is slightly killing me, it was nice to have a change of weed to pull. It was also surprisingly nice to only have 7 of us working in one area. It's not that we don't all get a long or that I don't particularly like the girls who were working in Complex B, it just, it was different. I think it's good to have a change of environment. Which is good since for our next project we won't be seeing much of each other at all.

That's right, we've gotten word that our next project will be working in an Elementary school in Sacramento. North highlands to be exact. Each of us will be placed as teacher's assistants in different K-6 class rooms. We will also monitor recess and the after school programs.

So while we will be an NCCC team, we will be doing individual work. It's going to be quite the change.

But then again, after 4 weeks of straight weeding, I might be ready for an education project and some alone time.

*The Scotch Broom does NOT look like this. Imagine the plant without the vibrant flowers and as Bonnie said, the smell of cucumber surrounding you. That's what we tackled today.