[pdx] Mount Hood Near Sunset, Vance Park, Gresham

2849.The Wife™ is of the opinion we need to spend more time outdoors. I agree.

Right now I enjoy long walks in the park, which sounds very singles-bar-ish, which is awkward since I'm happily married.

Anyway.

This is the sort of thing you'll see in Vance Park, in Gresham, late on a early-Summer evening:

Vance Park is on SE 182nd Avenue, just south of Mill Street, a short walk from SE 181st and Stark. So it's accessable. Just a pleasant city park, nothing special except maybe an undefinable something that concentrates time and space into a feeling of … well, something or other. 

It backs up to an old gravel quarry on its eastern margin that you can reach via SE 190th Avenue. It's possible to get into it this way, from the park, as some enterprising people have made a hole in the fence there and here, but I'd advise against it. That first step … it's a lulu. 

It's possible to get some gorgeous shots of Mount Hood though. I really wanted something like this since the cloud adds more than a little bit of drama. That's the maximum zoom the Kodak EasyShare will allow, which is all the optical zoom plus a bit of digital zoom.

… context is all, as they say. Here's some of that, too.

I really recommend Vance Park. It's got a nine-hole disc golf course, a little panhandle which reaches back into some treebound seclusion (which would be good on a hot day, we got the feeling), and a nice amount of lawn and the people around there are awfully decent sorts.