Corvallis OR

Neither TD nor I had ever been to Corvallis - though we thought we might end up living there as it was TD's first choice for a postdoc for a while. We had a great time visiting our friends T & J and their adorable toddler M. The weather was unseasonably cool and rainy (blame La Nina - its the same reason its been unseasonably hot and dry where we live) but was a nice change. It never really rained on us so we don't have much to complain about.

We went on a couple of short hikes.

 TD showed M and T how to look for animals under logs

 Baby M is a budding biologist! She was super interested in finding insects in the dirt.

 Banana slug!

 BIIIIIG trees. They don't make them like that around here!

 Banana slugs were out in full force...

 We even got to see a newt pond. Too late for the breeding aggregations, but there were still lots hanging out in the water.

 A rough skinned newt - Taricha granulosa

After the hike, we did a little wine tasting. We visited a winery in the beautiful Harris Valley. It was so picturesque - there was even a covered bridge!

The winery makes only dessert wines. Yum!

 TD caught a frog - Baby M was very impressed!

After a hard day of hiking and wine tasting J and Baby M made us a pizza. We had so much fun hanging out with these guys - I wish we didn't live on opposite corners of the country.