Paul's World
Paul Gerald: Hiker, Writer, Breakfast GuyPeaceful Place: Leach Botanical Garden
This week our Peaceful Place in Portland is Leach Botanical Garden.
Leach Botanical Garden
Category: Parks and Gardens
One way to look at Leach Botanical Garden is that it’s a beautiful little piece of creek-side nature just a couple minutes from the Pick-n-Pull on SE Foster. In that respect alone, it’s remarkable. That so few Portlanders seem to know of its existence adds a certain air of discovery to your first trip.
Walk around its pleasant paths, and you’ll find yourself surrounded by several gardens in one: a native plant collection, a historical collection, and designed to simulate different ecosystems around the Northwest, plants from the Southeast, a camellia collection, a fern collection.
Down at the bottom of the hill is Johnson Creek, which offers yet another surprise. Did you know that this 26-mile-long creek has salmon and steelhead runs? Right here in the city, no less.
But what really strikes me about the place is that it still feels like a home we’re allowed to visit. In fact, the owners, John and Lillia Leach, left the place to the city. They were grandchildren of Oregon Trail pioneers, he a druggist and she a botanist. They bought this place in the 1930s, built the stone cabin and later the house, and named the place Sleepy Hollow. He died in 1972, she in 1980, and they left the place to the city — to us.
I think you’ll find it easy to feel like their guests as you stroll through the woods, sit by the creek, and enjoy visiting their home.
Essentials
6704 SE 122nd Ave., Portland, OR – 503-823-9503 — leachgarden.org
Admission: Free. Hours: Tuesday to Saturday 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., Sunday 1 to 4 p.m.
TriMet #10 or #71 to SE 122nd and Foster. Plan your trip to this stop.
Back From Retreat
Whew.
I just spent three days and nights off the grid, and coming back is a rush. I won’t go into too much about what the retreat was, except that it was all about being alone with me. No phone, no podcasts, no book, no music, certainly no computer. The idea was just to remove as many distractions as possible so I would be left only with the internal ones: my thoughts, in other words. And man, there’s a lot of thoughts. So it was about observing those as deeply as I could.
The other idea was to try to let myself settle into feelings, to feel the stuff I normally distract myself from. And to simply be quiet and slow. And to practice self-love and nurturing. To just be with me, in a supportive and observant way, without any judgment.
I was at the coast, in stormy weather, the only person staying in about 10 houses on the road, with the beach at the end, the wind howling, rain pelting … magnificent.
Peaceful Place: Rocky Butte
I am still slogging away on a book called Peaceful Places in Portland, and occasionally I share a little find. This one isn’t so much a “find” as it is something I just love about Portland: Rocky Butte.
Read all about it over at PeacefulPortland.com. And you can join the project on its Facebook page or by following it on Twitter.
Blown Away by Broder
I was so wrong about Broder.
I said in my book that I didn’t think the food was that great. I guess I was “right” in that I was honest about my feelings. It’s just that I went back recently and, well, the food is great! Not sure what I was thinking before, but I’m impressed now.
It was a Portland Food Adventures “first meal of the year,” and you can read my write-up with photos over at BreakfastinBridgetown.com.
Moving Through Fear
A while back I had a funny story that I’ve shared in meetings here and there.
I had recently broken up with Woman A. At the same time I first met her, I had met Woman B, and I had a crush on her. A knew this … hell, B knew this. I asked her out when we first met, and she said no. Then I dated A, and B was still around sometimes as a chum. (Still with me?) So then A and I broke up, and I met C, whom I also wanted to date. We had been on a date or two when the following happened.