Oregon in Black & White

I have not had my darkroom set up for over 25 years. Time, lack of space, career demands and a dozen other excuses, such as raising a family, come to mind. Still, I have fond memories of the private world Linda and I would enter with only a safe light for company. The thrill of watching the image materialize on paper in the developer and the sense of quality that good, silver-based paper gives is quite different from the what most photographers go through now.

Here are a few images from Oregon where we lived for several years in the 1970s. The picture from Central Oregon was taken on the highway from Bend to Malheur, one of the loneliest, but beautiful, stretches of finished highway anywhere. The high north desert is quite different from what most people think of when they consider rained-on Oregon.
The other two pictures are from the Fern Ridge Reservoir, located only a few miles west of Eugene. In the early spring, there may be a lake below those clouds, but it is impossible to tell. The lichen-covered trees are typical. They drain the reservoir in the winter and it becomes acres and acres of mud flats, often lost in the rain and fog. Old roads and other hints of pre-water civilization show up, then disappear when the reservoir is refilled in the spring.