Oregon History Lesson

When asked about the weather in Portland we are always quick to boast that even though it may rain in the winter, the rain is good because it is snow on the mountain.  That is usually true.  But this weekend it wasn't.  The rain in Porltand, was rain on the mountain.  Lots of it. 

We just spent our 3 day weekend watching all the gorgeous snow melt away off of Mount Hood in a relentless rain storm that did not let up for even 5 minutes the entire long weekend.  It was nuts.  We had to dig deep and embrace the fact that we are Oregonians. 

Yesterday cabin fever was setting in pretty severely and so we ventured out to the Mt. Hood Museum. 

It was pretty great...until we had to go back outside...

Lets focus on the positive.  I had two really cool discoveries while at the museum. 

First, how amazing is the Skiway Tram?!  It was made of modified city buses suspended by cables connecting the town of Government Camp (where our little cabin is) to Timberline Lodge.  Apparently it was a financial disaster and only lasted 2 seasons.  Too bad.  Anything that combines city buses and skiing would have been right up WKFs 2 year old ally.  And an aerial route from govvy to the lodge would be sweet. 

Second, the museum had this model on display.  It is a model of the Mount Hood Lookout Station at 11,235 feet (pretty high!) which was used to watch for fires.  The model was build by Richard Muller.  Richard is the guy (an Artist) that owned (and loved) our house for a lifetime (and raised his 3 kids here) before we bought it from his son 5 years ago.   I just love knowing (by knowing I mean assuming) that this model was built in our basement and now sits in a museum where it is enjoyed by many. 

Update: the museum called to let us know that this model was totally NOT built by the same dude that lived in our house.  funny mistake...