I also wandered a bit about Ashland, which can only be described as a little slice of heaven on earth. Ashland is located near the California border.
Ashland is home to about 21,000 residents. By comparison, my hometown of Syosset has approximately the same population. However, the city has many cultural offerings that one would expect from a much larger city, and Ashland offers just about everything one would want from a major city.
Ashland is home to the Oregon Shakespeare festival, which presents presents 750-800 performances of eleven plays in three theaters from February through October each year. Three to five of those plays are Shakespeare plays. I attended Music Man on Sunday night, which was excellent, and have tickets for Don Quixote on Wednesday.
The OSF has led the economy to be primarily based on tourism and the service based industry, with over 100 restaurants, a movie theater, and several art galleries in town. A bartender told me that its actually become difficult finding a job in this town unless your in the service based or medical profession. Once a day I've tried eating at a place in town and the food has all been excellent. I was hoping to try a different brew every night I've been here, but have really started enjoying Caldera's Amber, which is actually brewed in Ashland.
The town is fiercely independent, and with the exception of the grocery store, (Safeway), every shop, restaurant and business in this town is independently owned. Attempts by major corportions to start in Ashland has been met with major resistance, and none survived for long.
The town was also very forward thinking in their creation of a 100 mile park in 1908 called Lithia Park, designed by John McLaren, the designer of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park.
People here are very liberal, so much that they think Seattle is a bunch of neo-conservative Nazis. My kind of town. They are also really big into conservation and recycling, but this does not surprise me for a state that features a tree on their license plate.
What a creative use of Christmas lights:
Similar to all of small town America I visited last summer, what I've found most interesting about Ashland is how nice and trusting the people have been.
Example #1- Just approaching a crosswalk will make people slow down to allow you to pass, instead of speeding up to gun you down
Example #2- I rented some movies at the local video store. When I asked if they needed to see some idea or for cc information, the owner replied- " Not needed- I trust that you'll bring it back." On top of that, the night drop off box was in fact a store window big enough for just about anyone not an elephant to crawl through.
Example #3- Actual sign outside of a store:
Overall, Ashland could be compared to a much cooler version of the town of Huntington (for those reading from Long Island), or a better comparison would be Flagstaff, Arizona (except Ashland is built in a valley, while Flagstaff is built on top of the mountain. I imagine its also pretty similar to Portland. Basically, Ashland could best be described as a more fuel efficient one of these:
Long Technical Section- No technical section, but realized I omitted speaking about our teacher, Jim Kish. Theres 7 students total, 2 "TA's" and Jim, all of whom are super helpful.
Its perhaps easiest to direct you to his website www.kishbike.com to get a sampling of his work.
Jim builds about 40-80 bikes a year, and has been featured in the NAHBS (North American Handmade Bicycle Show) Jim dismisses his talent as just experience, but every day I'm amazed by his craft. He's basically the Gabe Burkett or Jenny Hong of Ti. His welding hand always produces this smooth bead that always maintains the same diameter, consistency and lacks any sort of contamination.
On top of all that, he's been able to fill more than one hole or two I've put in the frame so far.
Just a few shots of his work:
Just when you think you've just put together a great weld, you just have to look over to his work table to see the road Bike that he's been building step by step as our class demonstration.
His top tube/ seat tube weld:
My Top tube/seat tube weld (same side):
Thankfully, the other side looks alot better:
Hopefully I'll be able to get a couple of close-up shots to be used in my portfolio...
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