The Alps of Everywhere

Posted on February 28, 2026 by compassrosequeen

In a previous post, I compiled a list of “Grand Canyons” around the country and world. Most of these were canyons with other official names but nicknamed the “Grand Canyon of ……” or the “Little Grand Canyon of …” That got me thinking, what about the Alps? This time of year, at least for me here in the winter of the Northern Hemisphere, I love thinking about snowy mountains and cozy alpine lodges and towns. So I set about to discover all the “Alps” I could find.

Of course, the Alps in Europe are, well, The Alps. You know, the big mountain range that spans several countries in continental Europe and has the iconic Matterhorn in it. (The real one in Switzerland, not the Disneyland ride.) I started writing this in the early winter, but now the winter Olympics just took place in the Alps! There are several subdivisions of that parent range, like the Bavarian Alps, and even sub-ranges of the sub-ranges, like the Dolomites in Italy. But there are some other mountain ranges in the world with the word “Alps” in their official names, and of course others that are nicknamed “The Alps of _______” (fill in country, region, province, state, etc.) Are they true Alps? What makes a mountain range or alpine town have Alps-like-qualities? Similarly, some towns or regions have “Switzerland” in their nickname, such as “Little Switzerland,” implying an alps-like feeling to the place.

Let’s see if we can figure out what makes a place seem like the Alps (or Switzerland). Here’s a rundown on Alps that I found online, and I’ll include photos of any that I’ve taken if I can find them in my old files. Also, keep an eye out below for information about a really cool woman writer/traveler that I met recently!

Mountain Ranges and Regions with Alps in the Name: (all but the last entry were found in a Wikipedia disambiguation page or elsewhere in Wikipedia)

  • The Alps proper (with subdivisions/sub-ranges being the Bavarian Alps, Eastern Alps, Julian Alps, Northern Limestone Alps, Southern Limestone Alps, Southern Alps, and Western Alps) – Monaco, France, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Italy, Slovenia, Lichtenstein – I’ve only seen the northern edge of the Bavarian Alps, when I went to Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany.
  • Transylvanian Alps (Southern Carpathians)- mostly Romania
  • Arrocher Alps – Scotland (part of the Grampian Mountains range)
  • Dinaric Alps – Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, and Albania
  • Lyngen Alps – mostly Norway
  • Apuan Alps – Italy
  • Sunnmore Alps – Norway
  • Norlund Alps, Princess Caroline-Mathilde Alps, Princess Elizabeth Alps, Schweizerland Alps, and Slauning Alps – Greenland (All right Greenland, we get it, you’ve got lots of awesome mountains!)
  • Southern Alps – New Zealand
  • Australian Alps – you guessed it – Australia! They’re part of the Great Dividing Range.
  • Japanese Alps – several mountain ranges in Japan
  • Pontic Alps – Turkiye (called the Parhar Mountains in the local languages)
  • Yeongnam Alps – Korea
  • Danakil Alps – Ethiopia and Eritrea – a highland region along the southern Red Sea – this one didn’t show up on the Alps disambiguation page, but it does have its own page in Wikipedia
  • Bohemian Alps – Nebraska, USA – evidently this is a region of gentle hills settled by Czech immigrants, and it reminded them of their homeland
  • Trinity Alps – California, USA – a sub-range of the Klamath Mountains in Northern CA and Southern Oregon
  • Mexican Alps – Puebla, México – I only found one reference to this supposed mountain range, and it looks like a university research paper. The mountain it mentions, however, is verified on Wikipedia as the 3rd highest peak in North America as well as the tallest volcano. Awesome!
The only picture file I could find of the Bavarian Alps was a photo I took of a page in my first Germany trip scrapbook. It snowed while we were in the area. Beautiful!

Mountains, Ranges, and Hills Nicknamed Alps of Their Area:

  • North Cascades National Park, Washington, USA – “The American Alps” – I only found out about this park several years ago, after visiting other parks that I thought would get that title, like Glacier NP in Montana and Rocky Mountain NP in Colorado. Now I’ve got to go!
  • Glacier National Park, Montana, USA – “The Alps of America” – my search for “alps of america” gave me website after website for North Cascades NP. However, I’ve been to Glacier, and thought there’s no way that someone hasn’t claimed the title for it. So I specifically googled Glacier NP and Alps, and sure enough, someone (understandably) says Glacier is as beautiful as the Alps! I’m happy for these two parks to vie for the title. Photo below.
  • Sawtooth Mountains, Idaho, USA – the “Alps of America” – Another website I found considers the Sawtooth Mountains of Idaho to claim this title for the country. Sure, why not? I haven’t seen them, and they do look beautiful in the photos.
  • Wallowa Mountains, Oregon, USA – “The Alps of Oregon” – Unlike the Cascade Mountains that I’m used to over here in Western Oregon, the Wallowas aren’t volcanoes. They have a mountain named Matterhorn and several glacial valleys. I’ve only seen the northern edge of them while on a road trip, but they are beautiful! Photo below. Also below in the references is a link to the Wallowas page of the website of an Oregon author/hiker extraordinaire that I discovered recently. I’d been following the Facebook profile “Hike Oregon” for a good while when I realized that it’s a person, not an organization like “Travel Oregon”. She held a booksigning event in Eugene recently, so I went to meet her. Franziska came from Germany, lives in Oregon, and writes hiking books with directions, descriptions, great photos, and helpful info. She also has videos on YouTube. And of course I bought one of her books!
  • Ruby Mountains, Nevada, USA – “the Swiss Alps of Nevada” – I’ve been to the Lamoille Canyon portion of them, which I’ve heard called the “Yosemite of Nevada.” It is spectacular! I went in winter so we couldn’t hike much, but just walking up the snow-covered road held vista after vista. Photo below.
  • “Issaquah Alps” – Washington, USA – the unofficial name of some highlands near Seattle
  • Davis Mountains – “The Alps of Texas” – a mountain range in West Texas
  • Hill Country Drive – “The Swiss Alps of Texas” – 2400 foot peaks on this scenic road trip
  • Borscht Belt, New York, USA – aka “Yiddish Alps” – An area of the Catskill Mountains that used to be an area where a lot of Jewish Americans would vacation; the Yiddish Alps name was given by Larry King.
  • East Durham area, New York, USA – aka “Irish Alps of New York” – Also in the Catskills, a region settled by people from Ireland in the early 1900s.
  • Canadian Rocky Mountains, British Columbia & Alberta, Canada – “Canadian Alps” – I only found one reference to Alps in Canada, and of course it’s the Rockies. With epic national parks like Banff, Jasper, and several others, the Rockies are the strongest contender for the title. I was surprised not to find any other websites referring to them as Alps. But maybe Canada tries to differentiate their mountains from the European ones.
  • Lake District, Chile – “Chile’s Alps” – offers a “milder Andes Mountain experience than Patagonia” and the town inside the Vicente Pérez Rosales National Park “has a Swiss Alps feel to it” according to the article below. From what I’ve seen in photos, the Patagonia region of Chile and Argentina resembles the Dolomites in Italy’s Alps, so I say both regions qualify for an Alps designation.
  • Cordillera Central, Dominican Republic – “Dominican Alps” – This tropical playground has the Caribbean’s highest mountain, Pico Duarte, at over 10,000 feet.
  • Rwenzori Mountains, border of Uganda & the DRC – “Africa’s Own Alps” as well as “Mountains of the Moon” – these mountains look amazing on the websites and Wikipedia page. I did see small mountains in the DRC as I looked across Lake Abert from the Uganda side, but was not far south enough to see these beauties.
  • Gamburtsev subglacial mountains, Antarctica – “Antarctica’s Hidden Alps” – the NBC article below has some great graphics to show the Alps-sized/shaped mountain range sitting below a giant ice sheet.
  • Saxon-Bohemian Switzerland, Germany and Czech Republic – this region straddles the border of Southeast Germany and Northwest Czech Republic and was so named by artists Adrian Zingg and Anton Graff, because it reminded them of their homeland, the Swiss Jura. I’ve been to the Saxon Switzerland National Park and hiked (in the snow) to the Bastei Bridge. Seems funny to me to have a place so close to Switzerland be nicknamed that, but it’s beautiful no matter what!
  • The Himalayas: Just kidding! They’re the highest mountains in the world, and don’t need to be the Alps of anything. They are the epic Himalayas with their own personality. We should have “Little Himalayas” around the world!
Glacier NP, MT
Wallowa Mountains, OR
Lemoille Canyon, Ruby Mountains, NV
Bastei Bridge, Saxon Switzerland, Germany

Cities, Towns, and Resort Villages With “Alps” (or “Switzerland”) in the Name or Nickname:

  • Alps, Georgia, USA – An unincorporated community in the U.S. state of Georgia, elevation 850 feet. Not sure why this tiny town was named Alps. See the town of Helen for a more alpine-sounding destination.
  • Swiss Alp, Texas, USA – Another unincorporated community, but this one was settled by German Lutherans around 1865.
  • Alpine, Wyoming, USA – The town of Alpine, aka Alpine Junction, sits at elevation 5,663 feet and at the junction of rivers, mountain ranges, and U.S. routes 26 and 89.
  • Alpine, Arizona, USA – A much smaller Alpine “census-designated place” with a population 145. Not sure how it got its name.
  • Alpine, Texas, USA – A high desert city at over 4,000 feet elevation and surrounded by mile-high mountain peaks
  • Helen, Georgia, USA – aka “Georgia’s Alpine Village” – The town of Helen seems to have a similar history as Leavenworth, Washington – a dying lumber town reborn as a German-style tourist destination near the mountains, this time the Blue Ridge Mountains of the Appalachians.
  • Leavenworth, Washington, USA – “An Alpine Village in Washington State” – Same story as above, but this one on the rain shadow side of the Cascade Mountains. I went there with a friend several years ago so I’ll have a photo below, and yes, it’s feels a lot like Germany! Plus, they now have an alpine coaster on the side of a hill that I want to take my family on if we ever make it up there.
  • Helvetia, West Virginia, USA – A “Little Switzerland” – this town in the highlands of West Virginia was settled by Swiss immigrants and kept its culture in many ways
  • Heber Valley and town of Midway, Utah, USA – “Utah’s Little Switzerland” – named for its mountain location in the Wasatch Back range and Germanic heritage
  • Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania, USA – “America’s Little Switzerland” – This mountain town was named for a Native American Olympic gold medalist and boasts scenic railroads and hiking trails.
  • Afton Alps Resort, Minnesota, USA – A ski resort surrounded by Afton State Park
  • Mazamitla, Jalisco, México – the “Mexican Alps” or “Little Switzerland of México” – I found multiple articles about this quaint resort town sitting at an elevation of 2200 meters in the mountainous southwest of the country, where residents of Guadalajara go to get away from the heat. It is considered a “Pueblo Mágico,” which according to Wikipedia is a town designated by the Secretariat of Tourism that offers visitors “cultural richness, historical relevance, cuisin, art, crafts, and great hospitality.”
  • Arteaga, Coahuila, México – the “Switzerland of México” or “the Mexican Switzerland” – Another of México’s official “Pueblo Mágico” towns, this one is in the northeast corner of the country, next to the Sierra Madre Oriental range, and has wooden cottages and skiing. Not sure which town is more alps-like, but Mazamitla and Arteaga both sound beautiful!
  • Ouray, Colorado, USA – the “Switzerland of America” town in the San Juan Mountains of the Rocky Mountain range.
  • Jackson, Wyoming, USA – this town “reflects the Swiss Alps” according to The Travel magazine; and with nearby ski resort villages and Grand Teton National Park, I’m inclined to agree. I think my friend and I drove through it on our way back to her house in Montana after visiting Yellowstone and Grand Teton parks, but I don’t think I got any photos of it. So I’ll include one of my favorite pics of the Tetons.
  • Stowe, Vermont, USA – the “Ski Capital of the East” at the bottom of the highest mountain in Vermont
  • Telluride, Colorado, USA – another San Juan Mountains town, in a box canyon with a 365-foot waterfall overlooking the town
  • Winthrop, Washington, USA – the “Swiss Alps of Washington” (thus rivaling Leavenworth), with North Cascades National Park as a backdrop
  • Lake Placid, New York, USA – Olympians used to ski in this town in the Adirondacks
  • Mt. Angel, Oregon, USA: This little town has an interesting immigrant history, with Swiss monks building a monastery in the late 1800s and Bavarian settlers following. The downtown is decked out German-style, and they host the state’s largest Oktoberfest in fall. It’s in a mostly flat part of the Willamette Valley, so not exactly alpine, but the monastery is built on a small hill that has great views of the Cascade Range.
Grand Teton NP, WY (I didn’t have any photos of Jackson, WY)
Leavenworth, WA
Mt. Angel, OR

So, what do you think? What makes a place “Alps-like” or like a “little Switzerland”? I think it’s anywhere with beautiful mountains and/or cozy villages. What is the nearest “Alps” to you? Or other places that I missed? I did read a fun article recently about Scandinavian towns here in the USA, but that leads to a whole new list.

References: (aside from Wikipedia, and in no particular order; some are official travel sites for an area or magazines, and others are blogs by fun travel writers)

All photos were taken by me (unless my friend Jas took the selfie of us in Leavenworth).

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Love + Oregon

Posted on February 14, 2026 by compassrosequeen

Happy 167th birthday, Oregon! And yes, my 8th & 9th grade math students did the 6-7 hand gestures when they saw that message on my digital white board yesterday. Because despite the news articles declaring that adults killed the fad, 6-7 is still here. They love it.

Fortunately, my students also love Oregon. The warm-up question I assigned for the day wasn’t a math problem but “What is your favorite place in Oregon?” And they answered with gusto. Possibly to postpone doing math work.

Now I wish I’d kept a tally on the places they listed, but I’ll try to recount the best I can remember. I’m pretty sure the most mentioned locale was Crater Lake. Next was definitely the coast, with Coos Bay being the most mentioned coastal city. After that was the local rivers, especially the McKenzie. Several of the kids are really into fishing. A few kids mentioned vacation spots like Sunriver in Central Oregon and the Wallowa Mountains in Eastern Oregon. I was pleased that so many of my students love the outdoors!

Not many of them mentioned human-made places, but I know one of the 12th graders in my homeroom (who recently graduated early, congrats to her!) loves the Enchanted Forest theme park. My husband and I heard the news yesterday that Roger Tofte, who built it, passed away at age 96. May he rest in peace and his legacy live on.

I know I ask this nearly every year, but what are your favorite places in Oregon? I don’t know if I can narrow down mine very well (I love all of Oregon too much), but this last summer I finally made it down to the water’s edge in Crater Lake. My 17yo stepdaughter came with me while Chris hung out with the rest of the kids up at the rim. The trail down will be closed for the next couple years while they revamp the boat ramp, so I was grateful to get there before that! The water was beautiful, but our family’s favorite sight that day was the rainbow-cloud above one of the peaks on the rim.

A new favorite for me is the similarly-named Carter Lake in the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area. It’s a low-key rustic campground along a small lake, complete with a little sandy beach to play on. It also has a trail over the dunes to the ocean beach, but be forewarned that it is a hefty workout. The 17yo was the only one to join me on that one, too, while everyone else played by the lake. We caught the sunset and saw one of the protected Snowy Plover birds.

As for my favorite human-made place, of course it is the Enchanted Forest. We took my mom there on Mother’s Day for her 70th birthday that week. She loved it as much as when she went there for her 40th birthday. My brother came, too, and had a blast playing there with our kids. Oregon is magical!

Me, Mom, and bro at the Enchanted Forest
Carter Kids at Carter Lake
Beach at end of Carter Dunes Trail
Crater Lake at end of Cleetwood Cove Trail
Ice cloud rainbow over Crater Lake rim

Photos from 2025, taken by me aside from the one I’m in. Please tell me your favorites in the comments below! And stay tuned for future posts. I’m still working on a fun article as well as a more serious one. Wishing you a happy Valentine’s Day and Oregon Statehood Day.

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Goodbye 2025, Hello 2026

Posted on December 31, 2025 by compassrosequeen

Hello to my friends, family, and any followers that I don’t know personally. Happy New Year and 7th Day of Christmas!

This year, I did not get any Christmas cards or newsletters sent out, so this post will have to do as far as a family update for the year. If you still need some Christmas cheer, there is a link below to an article Chris wrote recently about Charles Dickens, inspired by the film “The Man Who Invented Christmas.” I think I posted about most of our family outings and adventures on previous posts, so I won’t go into detail here. Read on for highlights of the year and updates. And stay tuned to future posts; I’m currently working on a sequel to my Grand Canyons article (“The Alps of Everywhere”) and one for a “Top 10 Things to Do in Eugene/Springfield Area”.

Here is a rundown of family highlights and new experiences for 2026:

In the winter, the kids got to bring a friend with them to play in the snow at Willamette Pass. We also got a bit of real snow here in the Valley instead of an ice storm, so I taught the kids how to make snow ice cream. In the spring we took my mom to the Enchanted Forest for her 70th birthday celebration on Mother’s Day. There, we all got tee-shirts with one of Chris’ drawings on it! They recently added that design to their online store, so you can order one if you want. Link below. Later in the spring, we bought a house! It’s a cute cottage that we are remodeling to make room for each of our 5 kids to have their own bedroom. Many thanks to my real estate agent cousin for the great find! This summer we camped at Carter Lake (part of the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area) and visited Crater Lake National Park. This was the kids’ first full national park, and Chris’ first time to Crater Lake; he’d been to other national parks in the country but not Oregon’s. At the end of the summer, we went to Oaks Park in Portland so the kids could experience an amusement park with lots of rides. They loved the big scary roller coaster, and two of the kids roller skated in the nation’s oldest roller skating rink! Then on my birthday, we checked out the more northern coastal town of Newport and visited a wolf sanctuary. This fall, I went back to teaching. It’s been busy but fulfilling. My students are a hoot! I deeply appreciate my much-needed 3-year “sabbatical” in the insurance brokerage world while I got used to having 5 kids, but I am grateful to get back to where my heart is. Chris and I celebrated our 3rd anniversary in small-town Southern Oregon, exploring and taking in history. Just this week, we took the kids ice skating, a first for Chris and the two youngest ones. Our youngest had never even roller skated, so he was hugging the rim and having a tough time, but he refused to stop! By the end, he was able to skate a little without holding on. Next time, we’ll get there early enough to get a plastic seal.

Other than those new/big adventures, the year was filled with the usual rhythm of things: playing at city parks, springtime hikes, swimming holes and cultural festivals in the summer, visits to relatives and pumpkin patches, dressing up for Halloween, kids’ birthday parties (they just keep getting older and older! And taller and taller! Only the youngest kiddo is shorter than me now), decorating for holidays and seasons, taking walks, drawing (Chris and the kids are so good at it!), writing (do check out Chris’ regular blog and posts by him and me on our church’s blog if you get a chance), playing instruments (17yo plays cello in the school orchestra, 13yo plays violin and trumpet), building Lego things, petting the cat, working hard, learning the hard way, learning from others, lamenting sad things, and all the other things that make up our lives.

Some of the teens & tweens are now pretty camera-shy, so we did not get a Christmas card-worthy family photo this year. They hide their faces when they see their picture-happy stepmom holding up the phone. What do you do? Life is not always picture-perfect. But I am grateful for this sweet family. And for our extended family, friends, and community organizations that support us. I’m hopeful that 2026 will bring more personal growth for all of us and new opportunities and adventures. May 2026 bless all of you, too.

Art & writing from Chris and me this year:

Chris wrote a post for both his personal blog and for our church’s blog about Charles Dickens. Check it out here: https://www.citysalt.org/blog/2025/12/19-charles-dickens

Here are a few of my most recent blog posts on the church blog: https://www.citysalt.org/blog/2025/10/24-beyond-the-binary-jc and https://www.citysalt.org/blog/2025/8/15-loving-our-enemies-within-jc and https://www.citysalt.org/blog/2025/6/6-evolution-of-faith-jc

Chris’ blog: https://professorpopinjay.com/ On it, you can find humor articles, pictures of his art, and his movie “non-review” posts.

Chris’ Enchanted Forest tee-shirt if you need to update your wardrobe with something fun: https://www.enchantedforest.com/product-page/adult-enchanted-forest-car-park-t-shirt

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Walk With Her

Posted on October 19, 2025 by compassrosequeen

There are so many world-traveling women out there now and in history that I’d love to write about. But I am lucky to know personally one woman that travels more than anyone I know! Tyler Burgess has retired from years of leading walking tours around the world and teaching fitness walking classes in Eugene, but she still travels to amazing places and shares them with us in a variety of artistic media.

Tyler grew up on a ranch in Wyoming, attended the University of Wyoming in Laramie, and then lived in Montana before moving to Oregon. I’m sure the epic beauty of those states impacted her wanderlust, but she told me she was inspired to travel from hearing her mother’s stories of travel (her father who was stationed in the Pacific Islands during the war).

She founded her business “Walk With Me” in 2000. For many years, she gave walking tours in 10 different countries, taught fitness walking classes at the UofO and LCC in Eugene, coached marathon walking training, and directed four marathons.

Now she is officially retired from all that, but she is nowhere near done traveling. She packs a fold-up bicycle into her luggage for many of her trips so she can travel by bike across places like Sri Lanka. In Europe, she’s done a few different pilgrimages on the Way of St. James. She says she loves those because the local churches have been praying for the pilgrims for over 1,000 years, and the hospitality is amazing. Her son lives in Ecuador, so she has a good excuse to travel around South America, too. She says her favorite specific place to travel to is Venice. The destination isn’t the goal; she loves meeting interesting people on the way. Her most recent trip (as of the time of this writing; I started this post a while ago but she keeps going places!) was to bike across New England.

Fun fact: Tyler played a part in my going to Afghanistan before I even met her. My mom had met her years ago through the singles group at her church. When I was looking for a teaching job, Mom ran into Tyler and told her that I’d been offered a job in South Korea and one in Afghanistan, but was leaning toward Afghanistan. Despite having joined the army and going to live in Germany during the Cold War when she was half the age that I was when I went to Afghanistan (see my previous article about her journeys), Mom was understandably anxious about my decision. She asked Tyler what she thought I should do. Tyler said something like, “Oh, she should go to Kabul! What an opportunity!” Mom felt that was confirmation from God that I would be okay or at least was making the right decision. That helped me feel better about it, too, because I didn’t want to cause emotional distress for my family.

Years later, after I had returned to the U.S. and was teaching and living in the Eugene area, I found a couple of her Oregon walking guidebooks in local bookstores. One of them was about Eugene walks, complete with sketches of things she’d seen along the way. I did some of the walks from the book and loved them.

Now Tyler attends the church I do, so I am getting to know her myself! And I get invited to her travel talks. I’ve been to a few of them. It’s so neat to hear about her trips and look through her watercolor hand-painted travel journals. She also puts together fast-paced Youtube videos and writes about her trips on her blog. You can find links to those on her website https://walk-with-me.com/, but here are a couple photos I’ve taken of the pages in her travel journals. Postcards of her Oregon-themed sketches can be found in the Eugene Cascades to Coast (Travel Lane County) visitor’s center in downtown Eugene. And you can find lots of her books on Amazon, including city walk guidebooks and sketchbook diaries for some of her bigger walks like the Way of St. James in Europe.

If you’re in the Eugene area, I hope you get to meet Tyler! And if not, you can buy her books on Amazon.

Mom and Tyler at her book booth in 2024 when Mom and I did the Springfield Art Walk

Categories: Journeys of Women | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

Wolf-Themed Trips and Back to School

Posted on October 11, 2025 by compassrosequeen

My husband and I celebrated our 3-year wedding anniversary last month, with our first kid-free overnight trip! We stayed a night at the Wolf Creek Inn, an historic site in the Oregon State Parks system. More about that later, as well as the White Wolf Sanctuary trip that we and the kids took in August. But first, a big announcement.

If you’re friends with me in the real world or Facebook, you may know this already, but I thought I’d make it official on here, too. I went back to teaching! In my “Quick Update” post this spring, I talked about getting promoted to an account manager position at the insurance brokerage firm USI. There were some aspects of that position that I really liked, but it hit me all of a sudden that I really missed teaching after three years away from it, and I’d better get back into it before it was too late.

Fortunately, one of the schools I taught at before had a position come open for this school year. Now I’m teaching two classes each of 8th & 9th grade math, one high school math support class, and a credit-recovery World Geography class for 12th graders. I’m exhausted already from trying to get back into teaching and find my groove after three years out of it (and six years out of teaching regular ed classes). But also energized by getting to work with kids again! They are so fun! I’ve already gotten a drawing from one kid, and another kid and her mom donated a neat map-themed trunk to my classroom. There are tough days, but I feel more like myself now that I’m back in the career I trained for. Chris says I come home with more interesting stories. Certainly it’s more fun (and easier on my ADHD than sitting in a cubicle). I’m very grateful.

I’m also thankful to my husband for supporting my move back to teaching. It won’t be easy for me to balance work with family, but he will help. He is so great! We enjoyed taking time out of our busy lives for our little anniversary overnight trip to Southern Oregon a few weeks ago.

Wolf Creek Inn started out as a stagecoach stop on the Applegate Trail in the 1800s. Over the years, famous visitors have included Clark Gable and Jack London. The latter wrote a short story here, and they preserved his little room as a museum piece as well as named a the peak just south of town after him. We hiked it and enjoyed the views, although it looked like the Smoky Mountains due to the Moon Fire complex. The next day, we visited the nearby ghost town of Golden (also a State Heritage park in the Oregon State Parks system) on our way out. Speaking of ghosts, Wolf Creek Inn has embraced their alleged haunted status, so they have gone all out on Halloween decor. We even found Jack London, or at least a skeleton on the bed in his museum room! It was a little overwhelming. But the place kept its charm. The ballroom upstairs wasn’t decorated as Halloween-ish, and had big tables to spread out on, so we hung out up there to work on our writing and art.

Wolf Creek Inn in September
View from London Peak with wildfire nearby
Me, “teaching” in the Golden school; photo by Chris

Wolf Creek Inn is also an interpretive site along the Applegate Trail, complete with covered wagon and informational signs and a picnic table. A great spot to stop for a break on a road trip. We also visited a different Applegate Trail site in Myrtle Creek on the way down that was really neat. When I lived in Myrtle Creek many years ago, I didn’t know there was a hike you could do along the ruts of the trail! It goes up a bluff with great views of the valley and South Umpqua River below. In that area, we also stopped at Pizza Palace in Tri-City so Chris could see why his pizza restaurant reminds me of it, and ate lunch at Ken’s Sidewalk Café in Canyonville. I’ve shown Chris and the kids some of my old haunts in this area before, but it was fun to show him around a bit more without the kids. Wolf Creek Inn makes a great weekend getaway!

Speaking of wolves, on my birthday in August, we got to go to the White Wolf Sanctuary in Tidewater, Oregon. It’s up in the mountains near Waldport. The trip was thanks to the Summit Award I earned at USI. We made a loop of the trip, stopping to eat at a fisherman’s market in Newport and see the giant rock formations in the ocean at Seal Rock. We arrived at the meeting spot to get to the wolf sanctuary a little late, but fortunately they waited for us. It was a very educational and neat place. One of the wolves, Nukka , was the most friendly, letting us see her up close in her giant pen. She was beautiful. And she knew it. She would strut around and pose for us to admire her, reminding us of my cat Arwen. So cute! Thanks to USI for this experience!

Seal Rock State Park
Our youngest kid and Nukka
Nukka knows she’s beautiful!

This new (school!) year will be busy, so I may not get to write as much for a while. I’ve got a couple articles drafted and will get one of them out very soon (see below for preview). If you’re wanting some fall scenery ideas in the Eugene/Springfield area, be sure to check out my post of autumn photos from this past winter, a few posts ago.

Recently I’ve discovered a couple blogs that I think you’d enjoy. I’ll list them here along with websites and blogs from two very interesting local friends of mine.

http://www.walk-with-me.com – my friend Tyler’s website (with link to her blog on it). My next post is complete, and it’s about her fascinating life! She is an author and artist and led walking tours around the world for years. Stay tuned in a day or two for more about her, but if you can’t wait, check out her website.

jeromycilley.com – my former coworker at USI has had a very interesting life, too. He has some unique hobbies that he shares on his website/blog, including making music and hunting for animal skulls.

http://www.adventurouskate.com – Kate teaches women how to travel on their own.

http://www.thewanderingqueen.com – Michelle teaches women how to hike and backpack.

Categories: My Trips and Tips | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

Grand Canyons of Everywhere

Posted on August 17, 2025 by compassrosequeen

Notes: For this post, NP = National Park, NM = National Monument, SP = State Park, NRA = National Recreation Area, and BLM = Bureau of Land Management. All photos were taken by me. I’ve been working on this article for months, and am saddened by the recent news in Grand Canyon National Park. My condolences to all who are affected by the wildfire destruction at the North Rim. Donating to the Grand Canyon Conservancy is one way to help. I’ll list the link at the bottom of this post. I’ve also been deeply saddened by many other things impacting people in the national and world news lately. Please join me in praying for these situations to get better and/or helping out in any way you can.

Recently I saw a photo of Grand Canyon NP, and it got my brain gears turning. I remembered having seen other gorges with the title “Grand Canyon” in them, such as the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone [River] in Yellowstone NP, or having Grand Canyon as a nickname, like Breaks Interstate Park, dubbed “the Grand Canyon of the South.” Could the U.S. national park one then be called “The Grand Canyon of the United States”? Or just the very literal “Grand Canyon of the Colorado River”? Or is “the Grand Canyon” enough to denote the big one in GCNP?

Being the information nerd that I am, I decided to look up Grand Canyons for every region and state in the USA as well as any I could find in other countries. Here’s a fun list of what I found. I’ll try to add photos for any that I’ve seen myself if I can find them in my old photo folders. Links to references and websites with multiple “grand canyon” locations will be listed at the end.

I had fun looking at canyons ranging from epically grand to small-but-scenic. Some are noteworthy for their width and others for their depth. Being from the state of Oregon with fairly dramatic topography thanks to volcanic activity, my definition of a canyon may be different than some people’s definition of a canyon. One time I was driving through Nebraska to visit family and came across a place called “Massacre Canyon.” While it had an interesting human history, I thought it was only a slight dip in the road compared to gorges we have back home. For many of the states, I could only find a “Little Grand Canyon” of some sort which resembled the scale and scenery of the many waterfall canyons we have here in Oregon. But I will happily let these states and regions lovingly nickname their local scenery as Grand Canyons, because, why not? Everyone needs one, evidently. You’ll notice that many of these are in national parks, state parks, preserves, and national geologic areas.

Cool fact: for Nebraska’s entry below (which is not the aforementioned canyon), I learned a bit of neat family history on my dad’s side! Also, for educational purposes, check out this description of the difference between a canyon and a gorge, although we use them somewhat interchangeably around here: https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/what-is-the-difference-between-a-canyon-and-a-gorge.html

Enjoy this list, and please comment about any you’ve been to or any you know of that I missed.

By U.S. regions, these are known as “The Grand Canyon of the…”:

  • Midwest: Turkey Run SP in Indiana – deep sandstone ravines carved by glacial action and later wind and water
  • North: Hull Rust Mahoning Mine in Minnesota (human made, so less interesting to me, but still looks pretty)
  • Pacific: Waimea Canyon, Waimea Canyon SP in Hawaii – formed by erosion as well as the collapse of the volcano that created the island, more than 10 miles long and 3,000 feet deep!
  • Northwest: the Columbia River Gorge on the border of Oregon & Washington, or Hells Canyon on the border of Oregon & Idaho. I’ve been to the Columbia Gorge many times to hike to the many waterfalls or gaze out from the Crown Point Vista House, and even went on a short river cruise with my husband Chris on our honeymoon. It is beautiful! Haven’t been to Hells Canyon yet, though. By some measurements, it’s the deepest gorge in the world. I’ll make it there someday.
  • East: Pine Creek Gorge in Pennsylvania or Letchworth SP in New York – explained more below.
  • West: Couldn’t find a definitive answer for this (or “Grand Canyon of the Rockies” online, but I’m voting for the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone in Wyoming. I loved seeing the canyon at Lower Falls even more than seeing the geysers! So big and beautiful. There are several other canyons in national parks that could vie for this title that will be mentioned in the U.S. States section below.
  • South: Providence Canyon SP, Georgia, or Breaks Interstate Park on the border of Kentucky & Virginia – I saw the latter with my ex-husband when we drove an hour or two from his parents’ house in Eastern Kentucky to see fall foliage there. The leaves hadn’t turned yet due to lack of rain, but I got a neat photo of a lady painting the lush green gorge. The ironic thing about this one is that it’s technically farther north than Grand Canyon NP!
  • Southwest: the Grand Canyon [of the Colorado River] in Arizona – I haven’t been to the national park side of it yet, but years ago I got to fly over it in a small jet and stop at the Hualapai tribe side of it with my ex-husband’s family who were living in Las Vegas at the time. It was spectacular, but in some ways so grand that I couldn’t even comprehend it. Can’t find my old photos, sadly. Someday, I’d like to hike down into it, at least a bit.
The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone
Crown Point at the Columbia Gorge

By continent/world region:

  • South/Central Asia: Band-e-Amir NP in Afghanistan – Okay, I am spoiled. I’ve flown over this one in a 10-seater jet, as well. When I was a teacher at the International School of Kabul, some colleagues and I organized a trip with a pilot friend who worked for an organization that flew people who worked for NGOs around the country. It was a day trip to see the Buddha Caves and other wonders in the Bamiyan area. They flew us over Band-e-Amir so we could see Afganistan’s Grand Canyon on the way there. It was so beautiful! I managed to get a photo or two over the wings of the little King-Air jet.
  • Central Asia: Charyn Canyon in Kazakhstan – the “Valley of the Castles” portion of it looks fantastic, literally.
  • Western Europe: High Cup and Cheddar Gorge in the United Kingdom, Cruz du Van in Switzerland, and the Bastei Rocks in Saxon Switzerland NP in Germany – This last one isn’t on the compilation websites below, but when I googled Grand Canyon of Germany, it showed up on the blog https://www.girllightning.com/2017/08/grand-canyon-germany-bastei-rocks.html I was excited because I’ve been there! I hiked to the beautiful stone Bastei Bridge in the snow once while on vacation from teaching overseas. A scene from the Han Solo movie was filmed there.
  • Eastern Europe: Vikos Gorge in Greece (listed as world’s “deepest compared to its width” by Guinness Book of Records), Tara River Canyon in Montenegro (over 40 waterfalls pour into it!), and Sulak Canyon in Russia (deepest in Europe)
  • Southern Africa: Fish River Canyon in Namibia – the largest canyon in Africa, one of the most popular hiking trails in Southern Africa
  • East Asia: Yarlung Tsangpo (or Zangbo) Grand Canyon in Tibet/China – the deepest canyon in the world according to Wikipedia
  • South America: Colca Canyon in Peru – home of the Andean Condor
  • Australia: Cappertee Valley in, well, Australia (that one continent that’s just one country) – the widest canyon in the world, according to Wikipedia
  • Northern North America: the aforementioned GCNP is of course the main contender for North America’s Grand Canyon, but Canada has one, too: the Grand Canyon of the Fraser in British Columbia (not to be confused with nearby Fraser Canyon, which looks even more epic to me in the photos)
  • Mexico: When I published this post, I just listed Copper Canyon (Barrancas del Cobre in Spanish) in the state of Chihuahua, México, because it looks amazing and has tall waterfalls and a fascinating history. However, my husband and I recently got to video chat with my ex-husband and his partner in México, and they told us about Cañón del Sumidero in the state of Chiapas. It looks amazing, too! Hopefully someday, I’ll get to visit both of these.
  • Central America: Pacuare River in Costa Rica is famous for whitewater rafting through rainforested gorges.
  • Oceania/Pacific: Waimea Canyon in Waimea Canyon SP, Hawaii, USA (see description in U.S. regions above)
Band-e-Amir NP, Afghanistan
Saxon Switzerland NP, Germany

By every U.S. State: (some of these may be repeats from the U.S. regions list). Note: I couldn’t find any feature referred to as a “grand canyon” for a few states. Any guesses? Read on to find out! If you’re from those states, please tell me if there’s a “grand canyon” of any sort there!

  • Alabama – Little River Canyon National Preserve in the Southern Appalachians has waterfalls, sandstone cliffs, and forested vistas
  • Alaska – Grand Canyon of the Noatak River, in Noatak National Preserve – people float the river in the summer to see more of the canyon in a short amount of time
  • Arizona – Grand Canyon of the Colorado River (aka GCNP) of course, but don’t miss Walnut Canyon NM. I stopped there on a road trip and loved the history (the cliff dwellings from the Ancestral Puebloans as well as the visits and quotes from legendary author Willa Cather). And the canyon itself may not be as big as at GCNP, but it was beautiful.
  • Arkansas – Vendor Valley – the deepest canyon in the Ozarks was labeled “Arkansas’ Grand Canyon in a marketing campaign by the owners of Cliff House Inn. Works for me! I’d stop there, based on the photos I see!
  • California – Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne [River] in Yosemite NP, or Kings Canyon in Kings Canyon NP – these both look beautiful in pictures, and are in national parks, so of course I want to go to both of them. I’ve been to Yosemite Valley in Yosemite NP, and it is a pretty impressive glacier-cut gorge, too! (Yes, that’s a huge understatement)
  • Colorado – Black Canyon of the Gunnison in Black Canyon of the Gunnison NP – this one looks so deep and epic in the photos I’ve seen! Black because it’s in the shade most of the day.
  • Connecticut – some random chasm made by installing a pipeline, according to Reddit. That’s all I could find. Sorry, Connecticut!
  • Delaware – Delaware Water Gap NRA – a dramatic mountain pass in the Appalachians
  • Florida – ????? couldn’t find one
  • Georgia – Providence Canyon – human-made from mining but still looks neat, or Tallulah Gorge SP – Tallulah Falls looks awesome in the photos!
  • Hawaii – Waimea Canyon (see above in Regions section) – I mean hey, I’ll use an excuse to go to Hawaii. This one of course looks epic in the photos.
  • Idaho – Bruneau Canyon on BLM land (not to be confused with Bruneau Dunes SP) – deep and wide, it looks like a NW-style geologic version of the Arizona GC but without the crowds. In fact, very few people make their way out there. Hells Canyon, where the Snake River runs between Oregon and Idaho, is by some accounts the deepest canyon in the world (if you use the top of mountains in the calculations).
  • Illinois – the Little Grand Canyon Trail in Shawnee Forest – compared to some of the others, the 100 foot sandstone cliffs may not sound huge. But for Illinois, that is pretty deep! And it has a neat natural staircase carved by water that you can climb.
  • Indiana – Turkey Run SP (description above in the Regions section)
  • Iowa – Lost Canyon in Whitewater Canyon Wildlife Area is “Iowa’s Little Grand Canyon”, aka “Midwest’s Little Grand Canyon” – 200-foot cliffs believed to be formed by a collapsed ancient cave system
  • Kansas –Arikaree Breaks – ravines and canyons in a badlands area, a nice break from cornfields! I feel like I saw topography that looked like this when I drove through Kansas from Colorado to Oklahoma.
  • Kentucky – Red River Gorge Geologic Area – Red River Gorge in the Daniel Boone National Forest boasts 41 natural bridges, according to the NPS. Kentucky also shares Breaks Interstate Park with Virginia.
  • Louisiana – Longleaf Vista Recreation Area in Kisatchie National Forest is “Louisiana’s Little Grand Canyon” – doesn’t look like a canyon or even a valley to me, but one website says “the topography is rugged by Louisiana standards” so we’ll let it slide.
  • Maine – Gulf Hagas – has multiple waterfalls gushing out of stone cliffs very near the Appalachian Trail
  • Maryland – Swallow Falls SP had some famous historical figures as visitors over 100 years ago! Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and Harvey Firestone camped there in 1921, according to the state park website.
  • Massachusetts – Chesterfield Gorge – a pretty hiking area with small waterfalls and 70-foot rock walls
  • Michigan – Canyon Falls is “the Grand Canyon of the UP [Upper Peninsula]” – the river falls 30 feet into a box canyon
  • Minnesota – Hull Rust Mahoming Mine (human-made from mining)
  • Mississippi – Red Bluff – an exposure of red clay, soil, and sand sloping into the Pearl River floodplain
  • Missouri – Grand Canyon of Charrette Creek has high vertical walls on either side of a wide floodplain, or Grand Gulf SP is considered one of the natural wonders of the Ozarks and “Missouri’s Little Grand Canyon”
  • Montana – Gates of the Mountains Wilderness Area was named by Lewis & Clark for how the cliffs seem to open up like gates as you traverse the Missouri River, or Bighorn Canyon NRA which looks more like the big Grand Canyon and is of course epic since it’s in Montana
  • Nebraska – Frenchman Creek Valley is “Nebraska’s Little Grand Canyon” or “Wauneta’s Little Grand Canyon” according to a local sign. It looks badlands-esque and also looked to be very close to where my Dad grew up. I sent him a screenshot of the webpage, and he says he would see it weekly when he rode along with his dad (the grandpa that died before I was born) to a job he did for the state, which was observing and recording which farmers were irrigating because the state was monitoring water usage.
  • Nevada – Red Rock Canyon near Las Vegas – I couldn’t find a reference to a Grand Canyon in Nevada because every search for Nevada led me to tours of GCNP from Las Vegas. But I’ve been to Red Rock Canyon (on BLM land) with my ex-husband and his family, and it was stunning. Pink and red colors swirling everywhere. Absolutely otherwordly. Can’t find my photos of it, sorry!
  • New Hampshire – Sculptured Rocks Natural Area is a geology-oriented nature preserve with impressive rock formations surrounding a popular swimming hole
  • New Jersey – Palisades Interstate Park (geologic site) – a 12-mile long and 1/2 mile wide area of cliffs and uplands just minutes from Manhattan – I had no idea that New Jersey has scenery like this!
  • New Mexico – Rio Grande Gorge – the Rio Grande’s “grand canyon” follows an eroded chasm in northern New Mexico. I crossed over the Rio Grande much farther south in New Mexico, so I didn’t see this beautiful stretch of it, but even the part I saw was sure grand!
  • New York –Letchworth SP “the Grand Canyon of the East” – follows the Genesee River over several large waterfalls
  • North Carolina – Linville Gorge – earns its nickname as “the Grand Canyon of North Carolina” as one of only two official wilderness gorges in the South, with the Linville River 1400 feet below the ridge and having one of the few old growth forests in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
  • North Dakota – Painted Canyon in Theodore Roosevelt NP aka “Grand Canyon of North Dakota” – named for its colorful rocks, it reminds me a bit of the Painted Desert in Arizona’s Petrified Forest NP.
  • Ohio – Conkle’s Hollow State Nature Preserve in the Hocking Hills region – I’d go see this one just for the name. But it also has 200-foot Black Hand sandstone cliffs that look amazing.
  • Oklahoma – Red Rock Canyon Camping & Adventure Park – formerly known as Red Rock Canyon SP as well as Kiwanis Canyon Park – its red rock cliffs now offer activities run by a private company since the state ceased operating it and some other parks to balance the budget. But before it was a state park, it had plenty of history – Native Americans used it as a winter camp, and was later a rest stop for pioneers on the California trail (you can still see wagon ruts).
  • Oregon – Owyhee River Canyon /Canyonlands in SE Oregon/SW Idaho is the main contender for the title according to the internet, with breathtaking scenery in every direction. Also shared with Idaho, Hells Canyon could count (see description in Idaho above). And the Columbia River Gorge, shared with Washington, is full of activities (see description in U.S. Regions above). For smaller ones only in Oregon, visit Crooked River Gorge for Central Oregon with the spectacular Smith Rock SP and other viewpoints, and Silver Falls SP with its dramatic waterfall canyons. And my friend Natasha says to make sure to include Crack in the Ground as a “Little Grand Canyon” in South-Central Oregon, which is a small but amazing slot canyon from a volcanic fissure. I’ve been to all of these except Owyhee and Hells Canyon.
  • Pennsylvania – Pine Creek Gorge, called “the Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania” – a perfect V-shaped gorge that is included in a state natural area and contains a state park
  • Rhode Island – No real canyons that I could find. My husband tried to help and found Cranston Canyon, a road construction project. That’s it.
  • South Carolina – Jones Gap SP or Jocassee Gorges – Jones Gap is part of the Mountain Bridge Wilderness Area on the Blue Ridge Escarpment and has waterfalls. Jocassee Gorges has waterfall canyons and a beautiful lake.
  • South Dakota – Spearfish Canyon “Grand Canyon of the Black Hills” – a long, narrow canyon of limestone palisades and waterfalls
  • Tennessee – Tennessee River Gorge – formerly known as Walden Gorge, is the 4th largest largest river gorge in the eastern U.S.
  • Texas – Palo Duro Canyon SP – the 2nd largest canyon in the country, according to the Texas State Parks website. Looks like some beautiful places I’ve seen in Arizona. Caprock Canyons SP was also mentioned on some sites, and has the bonus of bison herds.
  • Utah – San Rafael Swell, Zion NP, or Canyonlands NP – any of these 3 would qualify! And probably others, too, since Utah is chock-full of epic parks. Does Bryce Canyon NP count, too? The only one of these I’ve been to is Zion NP. Y’all probably already know about the NP sites, so I looked up San Rafael Swell. It’s a large dome-shaped geologic feature carved by flash foods into valleys, canyons, gorges, mesas, buttes, and badlands, according to Wikipedia.
  • Vermont – Quechee Gorge in Quechee SP is Vermont’s deepest gorge, formed by glacial activity
  • Virginia – Breaks Interstate Park – “the Grand Canyon of the South” (also in Kentucky) – description in U.S. regions section above
  • Washington – Grand Canyon of the Elwha or Palouse River Canyon – I’ve seen the Elwha River in Olympic NP, but I don’t think I saw this section of it, or the nearby section called Goblin’s Gate, which looks amazing.
  • West Virginia – New River Gorge NP is one of the USA’s newest national parks, and ironically the New River is one of the oldest rivers in the nation. The Endless Wall trail zig-zags along a cliff edge nearly 1,000 feet above the river. The park is also famous for rock climbing. I think my ex-husband and I drove over the landmark New River Gorge Bridge once.
  • Wisconsin – has many small canyons and no consensus on a “grand” one, but the Dells of the Wisconsin River is a 5 mile gorge with Cambrian sandstone rock formations and tributary canyons, and Devils Lake State Park has 500-foot bluffs above the lake.
  • Wyoming – the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone – description in U.S. Regions section above
Walnut Canyon NM, AZ
Yosemite Valley, Yosemite NP, CA
Crooked River Gorge, OR
Zion NP, UT

Compilation websites (for photos of some of the places listed above):

Donate to the Grand Canyon Concervancy: https://preserve.grandcanyon.org/campaign/705507/donate

Categories: Miscellaneous | Tags: , , , , | 2 Comments

From Cornfields to Castles, then Conifers

Posted on April 24, 2025 by compassrosequeen

4/25/2025 – Note that this article has been edited for accuracy. You’ll know which part when you get to it. 🙂

Last year I promised to write about my mom’s life journeys. Really, this post could be about both of my parents, but since my overarching blog theme is the journeys of women, we’ll start with her. I interviewed her for this, and found out some things I didn’t know! Read or skim all the way for fun photos.

My mom, Vicki, was born in a small town in farm country, Nebraska. Harvard is surrounded by cornfields. She likes to say she graduated from Harvard (adding “High School” after letting people be impressed for a moment). Her ancestry is mostly German, English, and Scottish. Random genealogy note: we’re distantly related to the guy that invented Kool-Aid, and there is a Kool-Aid museum in Nebraska! There is a strong German heritage in Nebraska, too, as evidenced by the existence of a fast-food chain called Runza that specializes in German-inspired stuffed meat pockets. Bonus genealogy note: Mom’s Scottish ancestors came to the U.S. as a young couple who ran away because she was the daughter of aristocrats and he was the family gardener and they weren’t allowed to be together, or so the story goes. Anyway, with all the German heritage around there, Mom took German classes in high school.

Her early travels with family were to the nearby museums including the Pioneer Village (we went there once when we drove to Nebraska to visit family, and it reminds me of the Oregon Trail museums we have here in Oregon) and the state capitol building in Lincoln. I have her little souvenir binoculars she got at Pioneer Village when she was a kid. Mom was enthralled with the big city of Lincoln with its department stores complete with escalators and chocolate pie. She also got to see dinosaur fossils at the University of Nebraska (GBR!*).

When she got a little older, she ventured out farther across the state with church friends to Scotts Bluff and a church college in Indiana. She also went with her family to visit her much-older brother in Colorado. She loved the drive up into the mountains and watching airplanes take off at the airport. She let me have this souvenir booklet of Colorado pictures that her grandma must have given her!

She says she didn’t have big travel dreams at that age yet. However, her horizons were to soon get much bigger.

When she married my dad right after graduating high school, they soon enlisted in the army for a three-year tour. They listed Germany as their top choice of where to be stationed since Mom had studied German. Not only were they lucky to be stationed together at all, they were assigned to their top choice!

They were stationed at the American army base in Hanau, near Frankfurt, but lived off-base in the nearby town of Oberrodenbach. They had an upstairs apartment in a Germany lady’s home. Because of this and my mom’s high school German classes, she got really fluent while she lived there. Dad learned some while there but didn’t have the head start Mom had. Mom remembers the beautiful cobblestone streets in Oberrodenbach and how you could hear the noise of trucks driving on them from across town. She loved it.

General life in Germany included good friends at the American chapel and good food. Her favorite dishes were schnitzel, currywurst, and goulash suppe.

They traveled around Germany whenever they could. Mom’s favorite part of the country was Bavaria. There, they saw all three of Mad King Ludwig’s castles, including Neuschwanstein (I’ve been there!) and another one that had a huge grotto with boats in it. She also loved the mountain ski town of Garmish-Partenkirchen in the Bavarian Alps. She says it was just the cutest town. It’s the highest one in Germany. They saw the Zugspitze (the highest mountain in Germany/ the Bavarian Alps) but she didn’t get to ride the historical cogwheel train to the top. Another highlight was seeing the lighting of Heidelberg Castle, another one that I’ve been to. Mom says that when her parents went to Germany to visit her and Dad, they all went to the town of Eckertsweier to meet some of my grandparents’ relatives.

Being in the middle of a bunch of European countries, Mom and Dad got to travel to several of them. They went to Holland, Belgium, France, Austria, and Switzerland. Between those and Germany, Mom got to see castles, cathedrals, and sobering visits to concentration camps.

One of Mom’s favorite places outside Germany was Paris, France. She never got to go up the Eiffel Tower, but she loved seeing it anyway. She remembers eating crepes along the Seine River and watching people paint there. Her other favorite city outside Germany was Salzburg, Austria. There they signed up for the Sound of Music bus tour, where they could see many of the locations filmed in the movie.

Mom and Dad loved Germany, but Mom was pregnant with me at the end of their three-year commitment, so they decided to return to the U.S.A. However, they didn’t want to live in Nebraska. They (we! although I don’t remember it since I was a baby) stayed with family there for a few months while they prepped for a new life across the country. Two of my dad’s brothers had moved out west, and my parents decided to join them. They’d been to Oregon to visit before, and with all the forests and mountains, it looked like Germany to them (minus the castles, of course).

They drove across the country with a baby in the back seat. According to one story I was told as a youth, I wouldn’t stop crying for hours in the car. As I remember the story, they filled my baby bottle with wine, and I sacked out for the rest of the drive. That may explain some of my idiosyncrasies… (Note: after reading this, Mom pointed out that she only put a tiny bit of wine in my bottle of milk or formula or whatever. I pointed out that makes for a less exciting story. The version my 10-year-old self remembers is funnier, although if it really happened to someone, I admit it wouldn’t be funny. Please do not fill your baby’s bottle with wine!)

For many years, Mom’s main travels were with us to Nebraska to visit family, with occasional trips to Washington for Dad’s jobs. She finally made it to the top of something big: Seattle’s Space Needle! My parents didn’t have a lot of money for tourist traps, but that is the biggest thing I remember getting to do as a kid on a trip. Our trips to Nebraska were pretty epic, too. One time when we were young, Mom took my brother and me back there, and didn’t want to drive by herself, so she took us across the country by train. It was so much fun! Another time, Dad flew us there in a 4-seater airplane (he was a flight instructor at the time). Guess who was the copilot? Mom! Yup, she learned how to fly! Not everyone’s mom gets to do that.

Mom took a few trips on her own when us kids were older, too, especially after my parents divorced. She went to Kansas and to Texas on work trips and enjoyed watching the storms. That’s one thing she misses from Nebraska. Oregon gets most of our lightning storms in the mountains, so we don’t get to see them as much here in the Valley.

Mom remarried when I was in college. My stepdad, Darrell, had also lived in Germany when he was in the American military, albeit earlier than my parents. Mom and Darrell have not been able to go to Germany together, but they’ve made up for it by going to towns here in the Pacific Northwest that have been made to look German. This includes Mount Angel here in Oregon, which grew in numbers in the late 1800s with many immigrants from Bavaria and a group of monks from a town named Engelberg in Switzerland. The name Mount Angel is the English translation of Engelberg. The abbey the monks founded on the top of Lone Butte is still a place of peace and prayer today. Mom and Darrell have also made it to Leavenworth, Washington. Leavenworth was a dying timber town when its residents came together with a creative idea to save it: recreate it as a German-themed tourist town. With Washington state’s Cascade Mountains on one side of it, Mom and Darrell felt like they were in the Bavarian Alps! And of course ate bratwurst and did fun touristy things like the horse and carriage ride and old-time photos. Mom says the photographer was retiring the next day after her photo shoot, so I can legally post the photo here, which is great, because Mom couldn’t find any photos of her in Germany for me to post.

Mt. Angel, OR
Leavenworth, WA
Leavenworth, WA

Before those trips, Mom finally made it to California for the first time. I think she and Darrell went there for their honeymoon. They drove down the coast a ways and enjoyed the Redwoods, beach, and Victorian architecture in Eureka before driving east over the mountains to the Mt. Shasta area and heading home on I-5.

Mom also made it to Canada with Darrell! They went with my aunt and uncle to Vancouver, B.C. to see the sights several years ago. Mom is terrified of heights, but she walked across a canyon on the Capilano Suspension Bridge! I was so proud of her when she told me that.

They’ve taken other trips, too, like a road trip across the country to Amish country in the Midwest and short camping trips in their RV. But lately they’ve slowed down to work on their property (they live on 9 acres in the country west of Eugene) and spend time with people they care about. My stepkids love going out there to visit “Grandma Vicki” and run around the property with my brother, “Uncle Ben.”

Mom and I have gone on day trips around Oregon in recent years, like to the tulip fields near Woodburn and fun places in the mountains like Newberry Crater National Monument. But I’ve been wanting for years to take her somewhere really neat, like San Francisco or Victoria, B.C. I’m not sure what the future holds, but if nothing else, there’s always hanging out in my hometown. She raised us in Eugene, Oregon, and there’s nowhere like it, with miles of hiking trails in the woods at the edge of the city.

In Holland? Nope, Woodburn
Newberry Crater National Mon.
Top of Skinner’s Butte, Eugene

*GBR = Go Big Red, what Nebraskans cheer at sports events (at least American football games)

Categories: Journeys of Women | 3 Comments

Quick Update

Posted on April 9, 2025 by compassrosequeen

Spring is here! And I’m coming up for air.

The last few weeks have been intense. I got a promotion at work to a new position. We bought a cute little house and moved our 5 kids and cat into it, thanks to great friends who helped. And then, from staying up too late unpacking several nights in a row, a virus got me and I got bronchitis/laryngitis.

Two trips to the doctor later, today I feel pretty decent. I’m very grateful that I could work from home for the last week, and for my coworkers who have been helping out and mentoring me in my new position.

I’ve been working on some fun travel/journey-themed posts for you all! They are coming soon. For now, I’ll leave you with a post I wrote a couple months ago for my church blog. The theme of the series was “Think about such things” Philippians 4:8. It made me think of what Frodo focuses on in order to survive his difficult journey in the Lord of the Rings, so that’s what I wrote about. Yes, my church let me write about LOTR!

Enjoy! https://www.citysalt.org/blog/2025/2/28-think-about-such-things-jc

Categories: Miscellaneous | 2 Comments

Admiring Autumn from Afar

Posted on January 30, 2025 by compassrosequeen

Okay, so I know this isn’t the time of year everyone is thinking of autumn. It’s January. If we’re daydreaming about a different season, it’s probably spring or summer. But I found some neat places nearby in the last year or two for viewing fall colors that I haven’t gotten to share yet. Besides, it’s January. The bleakest time of the year in many parts of the country and the Northern Hemisphere. My nation has a new president who is making sweeping changes, many of which are impacting people I know and populations I care about, like Afghan refugees that were promised to settle here and now can’t. I think we could all use some vibrant color right now; a bit of hope for the future. Read on for some photos and local destinations, and check back here in October or November for ideas of places to visit!

Mt. Baldy trail summit
Sequoias, Willamalane Park
Oakmont Park

Eugene and Springfield have some beautiful places to see fall foliage, often mixed with evergreens. The sunny summit of the Mt. Baldy trail (one of the Ridgeline Trails in South Eugene) has epic views and great trees, doable for all ages with its 1/2 mile trails to the top. Willamalane Park in Springfield has a great playground, but my kids love to play below the giant sequoias and deciduous trees near the runner’s track just as much. Oakmont Park in Eugene has flowers and foliage to spare.

Linslaw Park
Secret Garden, Belknap Springs
Japanese-American Art Memorial

How many Eugenians have heard of Linslaw Park? I’d driven by it a million times on my way to the coast, but never stopped. Last fall, my Central Oregon friend Tracey treated me to an overnight trip to Florence while she was in Western Oregon for a conference. We stopped on the way for a picnic lunch at this Siuslaw River wayside in the Lane County Parks system. It had a pit toilet, a small boat ramp, a couple picnic tables, and a sign with only the last letter of the park name still on it. But I loved it! Subtle fall foliage stood under evergreens and along the river. I’d been to the coast enough that month to not have an agenda of my own this trip. After that wayside stop, I decided I’d be along for the ride to any other places Tracey suggested. It was so much fun to see places I’d never thought to stop at! This included a coffeeshop in Mapleton that had kittens on the back patio and a Mexican restaurant on the bayfront in Old Town Florence.

The next place I found with great fall colors was up the McKenzie River. The drive along the way was devastated by the 2020 fire, but fall foliage is growing underneath the burned evergreens for a stark contrast and a visual of new hope. My friend Jas and my mom came with me for that day trip. We saw some blue sky (and slackliners) over Sahalie Falls, which was beautiful. But the visual highlight of the trip was the Secret Garden at Belknap Springs, which we walked to after soaking in the pools. The autumn splendor was all around the garden, and so gorgeous! I’d never been there that time of year. It was perfect. We finished off that trip with a stop for dinner at my family’s new favorite road trip restaurant, Takoda’s in the town of Rainbow.

The last new bit of fall foliage I discovered last year was at the Eugene Japanese-American Art Memorial. This is a tiny park tucked behind the Hult Center (performance hall). I’d been there before, but not in autumn. The Japanese maple tree was in full color, and the fallen leaves of other trees blanketed the ground with gold. The memorial honors the American people who were sent to internment camps during WWII just for being Japanese immigrants or American-born of Japanese descent. I hope and pray that we are not entering that dark of a time now.

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Happy New Year 2025!

Posted on January 1, 2025 by compassrosequeen

It’s 2025! I can’t believe it. This summer will be 30 years since I graduated from high school; 25 since graduating college. But mostly I’m excited for a new year of life and adventures. And I’ll be praying for our country and world.

The last few months were fast and furious due to work (we call it “Busy Season” or 4th quarter) and holidays. We got to do some fun things, though.

I’ll try to do a fuller post soon with some trips and tips from the rest of the year. But for now, family photos from the year. Our Christmas card photo was from playing in the mountain snow way back in February, because it’s not easy to get 5 kids in a picture at a time with no one scowling. Next, the only other family pic with all of us (not scowling) for the year, which took place in October at the coast right after my previous blog post. That was a nice day trip with the kids’ relatives on their mom’s side. We went to the beach that I’d tried to take them to on 4th of July weekend but was too packed then, the Heceta Head Lighthouse beach. They loved it! It’s small, which is nice so our teens don’t disappear 2 miles down the beach like they usually do at the South Jetty Beach. And it’s small because it’s surrounded by cliffs and a lighthouse. Beautiful! Lastly, our fun new experience for Christmas 2024 was to go see the film “Elf” at the historic Elsinore Theatre in Salem. I’ve been there before, but Chris and the kids hadn’t, and I knew they’d love it. It’s the most beautiful theater I’ve ever seen, built nearly 100 years ago in a Gothic style. Our family photo is from a high walkway in the lobby by stained glass (the artwork is all Shakespeare-themed). One kiddo isn’t in the picture because she wasn’t feeling well that day, but she is off to the side and enjoyed seeing the theater.

For more about our experience seeing that movie there, check out my husband’s movie “non-reviews” website at https://popinjaynonreviews.wordpress.com/2024/12/31/elf-at-the-elsinore-theatre/.

It’s getting late and I need to work in the morning, so I’ll leave off with a list of 10 (plus one I added later) things I hope to do in this new year:

  1. Travel & hike more. 2024 was busy with fixing up and selling the old house; plus we couldn’t go far since we’re stuck driving two vehicles to fit everyone.
  2. Buy a new house and van (okay, then we’ll be fixing up that house, so we’ll see how much traveling & hiking I get to do)
  3. Take Chris & the kids to Crater Lake National Park for their first time
  4. Host a monthly write-in with friends
  5. Work out more. I got a small stair-stepper for Christmas so I can watch hiking videos and pretend I’m hiking while it’s raining outside! Not nearly as fun, but helpful in Western Oregon, which has been extra grey and rainy this year.
  6. Take the kids to visit relatives in Idaho while Chris and I (and my Dad if I can get him to come) visit my relatives in Utah and Nebraska
  7. Get back into practicing my guitar
  8. Hike Broken Top with friend Jas, plus places she hasn’t hiked yet like Smith Rock
  9. Finish reading some books I started about step-parenting and other needed themes
  10. Play video games with the kids more because they love it
  11. Adding this one late because I forgot it: Take the family to Portland by train and visit Powell’s! We can do this one even before we get a new vehicle that fits us all, which is another goal for the year. Oh, and maybe go ice skating this winter? Our oldest loves it.

What do you hope to do in 2025? I’d love to hear your ideas, dreams, and resolutions in the comments! I hope you all have a good 2025, despite the difficulties and challenges of life and in our world.

Categories: Miscellaneous | Tags: , , , , | 4 Comments

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