Twenty miles beyond Harrisburg we found ourselves in the streets of Eugene, a town nearly the size of Salem and quite its equal in metropolitan appearance. It is a live-looking, well-improved town, and, I was going to say, gives the impression of a much larger city, but I fear I am overworking this expression in connection with these western towns. It is none the less true, however; the streets, the stores, the buildings, public and private, would do credit to a city twice as large as Eugene. Here is the state university of Oregon, with nearly a thousand students who no doubt contribute much to the evident activity of the town. The university buildings, beautifully situated on a grassy slope along the Willamette, are mainly of classic design. Like the public buildings at Salem, they impressed us as being rather inferior to what one would expect of a state-supported institution. Eugene is very pleasantly located at the edge of the foothills along the wide, level valley and within full view of the rugged coast range of the Cascades. The streets are wide and well-improved, many of them shaded by Oregon maples, gorgeous with autumn colorings when we saw them.
A shopkeeper directed us to the Osborn Hotel as the best in the town and it proved very satisfactory, indeed. It is a large red-brick structure fronting a public park and located conveniently to the business center of the town. We were given a comfortable room at a moderate rate, but the restaurant prices were quite up to metropolitan standard, though this was mitigated somewhat by the first-class service. The city water was exceedingly unpleasant, having been “doped” with chemicals to counteract impurities. We were assured, however, that it was quite harmless and suffered no ill after-effects from drinking it.
THE WILLAMETTE NEAR EUGENE, OREGON
From photo by Winter Photo Co., Portland, Oregon
Our run for the day had been a comparatively short one—one hundred and forty miles over roads better than average. We arrived in Eugene early in the afternoon and remarked that we might easily reach Roseburg, eighty miles distant, before dark. We went, of course, on the assumption that the Pacific Highway south of Eugene was quite as good as to the north of the city—an assumption which we found to be sadly at variance with facts. A garage man warned us not to expect a “joy ride” to Grants Pass, for though the actual distance is only a little greater than we covered on the preceding day, the run was much harder. All of which we heard with light-hearted unconcern, for it never entered our heads that on the much-heralded Pacific Highway we should find some of the roughest and most dangerous road since leaving San Francisco.
Out of Eugene we encountered hills, but the going was fair to Cottage Grove, a quiet village which marks the southern extremity of the Vale of the Willamette. We soon entered Pais Creek Canyon and the road degenerated into a rough, winding trail, muddy from a heavy rain which had preceded us only a day or two. The road was often strewn with boulders and cut up into ruts that gave the car an unmerciful wrenching as we crawled cautiously along. In places an effort had been made to get rid of the stones and mud by covering considerable stretches of road with planks, but these were loosely laid and did not mend matters a great deal. The road was often dangerously narrow and there were many sharp turns around blind corners. There was just mud enough to make us uneasy on the grades and to demonstrate the utter impossibility of the road for a heavy car in wet weather.
There was little respite from these conditions in the sixty miles from Cottage Grove to Drain. In places, improvement work was in progress which will do something to smooth out the highway for the motorist of the future. The only redeeming feature was the glorious scenery. We ran along green banks covered with giant ferns whose long fronds swept the car as we passed and we glided beneath closely standing pines under which the ground was carpeted with rank mosses. The prevailing green was varied by the coral-red clusters of honeysuckle berries and the early autumn reds and yellows of the deciduous trees.
ON THE PACIFIC HIGHWAY IN OREGON