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Real Oregon Country Fair-goers remember “Field Trips” with the Dead: the magical times when Kesey and his Merry Pranksters pranced around the grounds, ensuring every last face was stolen off Owsley’s freshest batch, coaxing you to slip into the oblivion of one of Jerry’s jams. Sounds molten just thinking about it. Fruition Continue reading
The Oregon Country Fair is debuting a new addition: This year revelers can stroll along on the maiden voyage of a new loop that veers off through an as-yet-virginal section of the forested fairgrounds. “It’s taken a huge amount of work to put in the new loop,” OCF General Manager Charlie Ruff says. “We’ve been looking at areas to develop new paths for many years.” Continue reading
Some people go to the Oregon Country Fair to lose their inhibitions, their worries, their minds or all of the above; more often than not, though, they just end up losing their cell phones. “Smart phones have memories,” a Samsung LG phone recently lost at the Country Fair tells me. “No pun intended,” the phone jokes, flicking an ash from his cigarette into the street where we are talking. Continue reading
Sorry folks, there’s actually no definitive evidence suggesting that Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, to whom the reversed title of this story can be credited, ever made it to the Fair, but it didn’t take more than three years — after the Fair’s beginnings in 1969 — for our annual psychedelic parade in Veneta to start taking on other famous faces. Continue reading
Supporters and organizers of Initiative 9, the Oregon Cannabis Tax Act (OCTA), submitted 165,000 signatures to the Oregon Secretary of State’s Office this morning, and more signatures are expected to be turned in later today, the deadline for initiatives to qualify for Oregon’s November ballot. Continue reading
How do you quantify a legend? How Sasquatch is Bigfoot? How Loch Ness is Nessie? In the realm of legend, it’s nearly impossible to gauge magnitude — how golden is Eldorado and how deep is Atlantis? Continue reading
Clouds made the eclipse and Venus’ transit across the sun a little hard to see, but we still know summer is under way. While the rest of the seasons morph through the different shadows of sopping wetness, the knowledge that here comes the sun, it’s all right, chills Eugene right out in the sunshine. Whether your summer is festivaling, floating or vineyarding, the fast and free or lazy and peaceful pace — you pick — of the Eugene’s other season says you have a cornucopia in front of you, so please partake. Continue reading
Faerieworlds, the yearly festival that encourages attendees to “live your legend,” returns. Celebrating fantasy, magic and, of course, faeries, this annual event of pixie dust and gossamer wings provides everything a faer-folk enthusiast could want. Continue reading
Long, five-car-caravan convoys, open air, live music, face paint, dehydration, hordes of howling drunks with beers in hand and marijuana smoke rising in plumes above their heads: These are the tropes of summer for those who love music festivals, and there’s no shortage when it comes to these monstrous gatherings. Continue reading
There is perhaps no better teacher than Mother Nature. Her curriculum is seasonal and her pedagogy is patience. And though we may at times ignore her lessons, her classroom remains willing to receive us. It is this truth that inspired Lydia Scott and Leela Greensberg to create the Grateful Growers Summer Camp for kids age 5-10. “Kids need to be outside more, engaging the natural world and learning about where food comes from,” Greensberg says. Continue reading