It's a Beautiful Day in W2 - Check it out!

[KQ]

Check this out - amazing the things you find for sale on our local yard sale FB page:

Beautiful 18ft tipi
FOR SALE
$800

Beautiful 18ft tipi
Calm atmosphere
Heavy duty 15 oz. duck waterproof canvas
17 poles included
All pegs, stakes, ropes , included for complete set up
$1700 to $2200. New

[billyk]

Are they located on the old base?

He needs an older jeep to be correct.

I knew my dad was stationed at some airbase in Eastern Washington during WWII, and for a moment, I wondered if this might be the place.

But after a little digging it turns out he was at the Naval Air Station at Pasco, which is now their city airport. Learned to fly Corsairs there, and later became an instructor himself.

[billyk]

I should add, the Walla Walla WWII airbase was used primarily to train bomber crews. First B-17s and later B-24s. Those guys had a 1 in 4 chance of surviving their tour of duty in Europe.

The Memphis Belle’s crew was trained in Walla Walla.

[splat]

Hey, Peaches, this is for you....

https://www.misfitgardening.com/how-...Peaches+%3f%3f

[KQ]

I knew my dad was stationed at some airbase in Eastern Washington during WWII, and for a moment, I wondered if this might be the place.

But after a little digging it turns out he was at the Naval Air Station at Pasco, which is now their city airport. Learned to fly Corsairs there, and later became an instructor himself.

I should add, the Walla Walla WWII airbase was used primarily to train bomber crews. First B-17s and later B-24s. Those guys had a 1 in 4 chance of surviving their tour of duty in Europe.

The Memphis Belle’s crew was trained in Walla Walla.

Interesting! Thanks for that bit of history. Here's something I found when looking into WWII military housing in this region:

Washington World War II Army Airfields

Also, if you're interested:

History Link: Fort Walla Walla

And if it's pictures you like check out this page maintained by Joe Drazan the former Whitman College Librarian:

Bygone Walla Walla

[KQ]

Hey, Peaches, this is for you....

https://www.misfitgardening.com/how-...Peaches+%3f%3f

That looks wonderful, thanks! Problem is.... they never last long enough for me to can them. LOL!! EAT A PEACH!

Cresthavens currently ripe for the noshing around here. Sooooooooooo good!

[KQ]

This is pretty cool - local boy hits the big time:




Larkin goes from baseball diamond to guitar man
Jim Buchan Union-Bulletin Sep 15, 2019


Coach a Little League baseball team for 23 years and you’re sure to get to know a plethora of interesting and inventive young boys who grow up to become even more interesting and inventive adults.

Trevor Larkin certainly fits that bill.

Trevor became a member of our team as a 10-year-old in the spring of 1992 and played three seasons in the Pacific Little League, highlighted by an All-City championship season in 1994 in which he was a key contributor.

Who knew way back then that Trevor was destined to become the lead guitarist in a rhythm and blues band — Allen Stone — that has become one of the genre’s most recognized and well-received groups worldwide?

The band recently completed a 50-day summer tour. And Trevor — in town to visit his parents Tim and Merry Larkin — agreed to drop by the Union-Bulletin and reminisce about his baseball-playing days and update his old coach on his life as a guitar man.

Unlike his ability to make guitar strings sing, baseball didn’t come easily for Trevor. But like learning the guitar, his strong work ethic and relentless determination made it all work.

By the time he was 12, Trevor was one of our top pitchers, batted cleanup and was the fastest runner on the team. We couldn’t have won the All-City without him.

Trevor continued to play baseball for the next couple of years. And he played basketball and ran track and field as well during his middle-school years at Garrison.

But by then playing guitar had made its way into his bloodstream. And as the old saying goes, when that bug bites you, you live with the sting.

“I started playing guitar when I was 13 or 14,” Trevor recollected. “It was after Little League, but music was always a big part of my life. My parents were great about never pressuring me, but there was always music in the house.

“And in retrospect, I recognized that the guitar came really naturally to me.”

Trevor’s first guitar, he said, “was an old beater” that his parents bought for him.

“I must have expressed an interest that I wanted to play, and they probably got it at some garage sale,” he said. “And I would hack away at it as best I could.”

He quickly graduated to his first electric guitar and basically taught himself to play.

“But as I progressed and got into high school, one of the great things was having Whitman College here in town,” Trevor said. “They have a lot of clinicians and guest speakers and jazz musicians in particular. And I took some private lessons from people stopping through.

“But it was exciting, teaching yourself, falling in love and becoming obsessed.”

Trevor graduated from Wa-Hi in 2000 and took his musical hunger to Boston and the Berklee College of Music.

“Berklee is not super well known outside of music circles, but it’s on par with Julliard,” Trevor said. “And it helped that I had family in Boston and that I had taken a couple of summer courses there. It was a fairly easy transition.”

Two years later, a bachelor of music degree in hand, he transitioned back to the Pacific Northwest and settled in Seattle where he made his way by playing in a variety of bands and doing free lance work with the Seattle Symphony as well as ballets and operas.

“I knew that I wasn’t ready for Los Angeles or New York,” Trevor said. “Musically, yes, but emotionally I was still a pretty sensitive younger person. I wasn’t ready for that hyper competitive environment.

“So I moved to Seattle and planned to stay for a few months and then go to LA. I ended up staying for 10 or 11 years.”

And it was during those years that the band Allen Stone was born.

“It was in the summer of 2011 and there was a venue in Seattle, the Sea Monster Lounge, where a lot of musicians would hang out,” Trevor remembered. “It was a dive, but a fun dive, and I played in the house band there on Sunday nights.

“And all of the guys who would subsequently become members of Allen Stone hung out there.”

One Sunday night Allen Stone came into the club in a panic, Trevor said.

“He had the opportunity to open for a soul artist in California and he didn’t know how to do it,” Trevor said. “He didn’t really have a band or know how the music business worked, so we agreed to go with him and learn the tunes.

“We learned the tunes for the set on the van ride down there. And the first time we ever played together was in sound check.”

It must have gone well, because on the second night the group was approached by a booking agent who wanted to sign them.

“We got very lucky,” Trevor said. “That second night was at a famous club in Los Angeles called the Roxy, and this booking agent saw our show and wanted to sign us. Our second day in existence and we had a booking agent.”

In short order, the band embarked on a 10-day road tour.

“Ten days became two weeks and two weeks became three,” he remembered. “That was in June, and in October we played the Conan O’Brien show. It happened very fast.

“We were at a point where we were hanging on for dear life, and it was really exciting when the band started getting those opportunities. For so many years taking any gig and hoping the phone rings, to have people asking you to do stuff is tremendous.”

The band was on tour for 300 days in 2012, including Europe for the first time, opened for the likes of Stevie Wonder and the Dave Matthews Band and made television appearances on the Jay Leno and David Letterman late night shows. The band also released its first record that year.

“All of those touchstones for the band were so incredible,” Trevor said. “We started with a beater van, progressed to a slightly better van and by the fall of 2012 we were in a tour bus.

“It was a very rapid upward trajectory that is extremely unusual for bands. But everyone’s life looked different in 2013 in a good way.”

The television appearances were particularly comforting to Trevor’s parents, he said.

“My parents have always been supportive, but Berklee was a great compromise since not going to college was never an option,” he said. “But it wasn’t until the Allen Stone band began to take off and the late night TV shows that my parents figured it was a good deal and that I was safe and that the bills were being paid.

“We were playing Australia and I took a picture with Paul Simon. They got a big kick out of that, and it is exciting for them to have those touchstones.”

The band is scheduled to release its fourth album in November and doesn’t plan to go on tour again until early next year.

In the meantime, the band members have gone their separate ways. Allen Stone, who grew up in Chewelah, lives in Spokane when he’s not on tour, and other band members have gone home to Portland and Los Angeles.

Trevor calls Nashville home these days and he satisfies his creative cravings with a podcast where he interviews people he finds interesting in and out of the music world. He also writes a daily newsletter/blog he calls Mind of Trevor.

“I’ve written something every day since Jan. 1 of 2018,” he said. “It’s ostensibly whatever I want to talk about on that day — arts and creating, travels, anecdotes and observations — and if it’s longer than a thumb scroll it’s too long.

“I’ve always loved writing and it is a natural extension of my travels and being a musician.”

Trevor is also using his downtime to work on his own band, Climb The Sky, a vehicle in which he is not only the lead guitarist but the lead singer as well. So far it is a three-piece band with a goal of releasing one song a month.

“This is a rock band,” Trevor explained. “The music is big, loud guitars, more like Tom Petty than Stevie Wonder. We have already played a handful of shows in Nashville and we will absolutely go on tour when the time is right.

“It is a fantastic counter balance to the Allen Stone project,” he added. “I co-write with Allen, but it is his show. With this band I get to be more the center of attention, which to my shame my ego enjoys.”

Regardless of the success Climb The Sky achieves, Trevor has no plans to part company with Allen Stone.

“My ideal career right now would be to do four tours a year, two with Allen Stone and two with Climb the Sky.

Whatever the future holds, it’s pretty certain that music will be the centerpiece for Trevor.

“I love music and am deeply proud of the person that it has allowed me to become,” he said. “I could have become a lawyer or an actuary, but I wanted to be a musician and am so happy I trusted myself and stuck with it.

“You can always do something different, which gives me permission to enjoy what I am doing now.”

[oftpiste]

Great story.

[KQ]

Mmmmm Andrae's Kitchen. Best gas station food around!




FRIED GREEN TOMATO PO' BOY is back!
Local green tomatoes fried in buttermilk and corn meal, house made bacon, Crystal hot sauce aioli, shredded iceberg, and pickles on our house Cuban roll.
#eatataks #atagasstation #notbadforagasstation

[billyk]

Don’t think I’ve ever seen fried green tomatoes, sandwich or otherwise, at a gas station. Looks good, though! I want that now!

[KQ]

Don’t think I’ve ever seen fried green tomatoes, sandwich or otherwise, at a gas station. Looks good, though! I want that now!

This ain't your ordinary gas station fare.

https://www.union-bulletin.com/local...12aab29d0.html

[KQ]

Well... well... well... look who got included in The Daily Beast's Mountain West Roadtrip:

This Mountain West Roadtrip Is One of America’s Most Underrated

[KQ]

So despite rising cases (rises that have directly coincided with W2 moving into Phase 2 and an influx of tourists) W2 is determined to court tourists and I get it - our economy is heavily dependent on tourist dollars but still I can't help but wish we could stay shut down.

Public streetery offers more seating to Walla Walla patrons

In a effort to bring people in and combat spread the city has closed streets, stung up festive lights and set up outside dining plazas:

[oftpiste]

I saw that on the news tonight and pictured you flitting from table to table visiting with friends.

[KQ]

I saw that on the news tonight and pictured you flitting from table to table visiting with friends.

LOL! Must be going all out to get the word out if they are showing it on your news. The city did invest quite a bit in those tables, umbrellas, lights and planters plus they built those deck extensions in front of each establishment for outside dining though I think the money came from some special fund.

Would that it were true, me fliting about visiting, but alas I'm not there yet and probably won't be for some time. I was just pondering what it would take to make me comfortable going out to socialize and I've not yet decided what that would be. Had a girlfriend invite me on a road trip to Bend a couple weeks ago. She went, I did not.

[liv2ski]

Had a girlfriend invite me on a road trip to Bend a couple weeks ago. She went, I did not.

I am with you KQ, while I am really bored with being cooped up in the casa, I just really do not want to get sick. Looks like our trip to Toronto, in September, to see Nightwish is toast. $400 worth of tickets down the toilet, unless they reschedule it someday later.

[oftpiste]

I'm with ya. I went to an airbnb on Vashon for the 4th with a friend but didn't eat out or anything and we were compliant with wise choices. We both felt a little uneasy about it all. Have to admit it felt good to be out in the world for a minute, but I'm far from ready to socialize in general and probably won't do the airbnb thing again until things settle down. Looked for Rozas at the farmer's market today. No luck yet.

but alas I'm not there yet and probably won't be for some time. I was just pondering what it would take to make me comfortable going out to socialize and I've not yet decided what that would be. Had a girlfriend invite me on a road trip to Bend a couple weeks ago. She went, I did not.

[TBS]

Had a girlfriend invite me on a road trip to Bend a couple weeks ago. She went, I did not.

Know that City of Bend is asking that people NOT visit due to a spike in Covid cases.

[KQ]

Know that City of Bend is asking that people NOT visit due to a spike in Covid cases.

You guys have a more robust year-round economy than we do. I will admit I was very surprised she took the trip. She's generally very level headed and is totally on board with masks etc. guess she just couldn't stand it anymore.

She stopped to see a friend in Sun River and laughed when the friend wouldn't let her in the house (outside social distance visit only). Not sure why she was surprised.

She knew better than to ask me if she could visit. I would seriously love to see her but she's in a hotter spot than me and often goes into work in DT Seattle as does her husband so yeah... let's touch base when things settle down.

[KQ]

Nothing says "come visit us!" like a pandemic logo face mask:

[KQ]

From Visit Walla Walla:

Did you see the incredible 16-page feature in Food & Wine Magazine highlighting Chef Andrae Bopp (of local Andrae's Kitchen renown)?

Our mouths are still watering.

And yours can be too - there's a little rumor that The Cheesecake is being sold by the slice at Andrae's Kitchen like, right now. Get some for Foodie Friday - we hear it's the best gas station food in the U.S. - don't just take our word for it!

“Andrae’s Kitchen is without any question the best restaurant located in a (working) gas station in the U.S.,” Ray Isle writes in "White Water Wine" for Food & Wine Magazine. “I defy anyone to eat an order of Bopp’s Voodoo Fries – hand-cut, Cajun-spiced, then topped with housemade pulled pork, pickled peppers, and a Crystal Hot Sauce aioli – and question the title.”

To read the whole article, visit https://www.foodandwine.com/travel/s...wine-excursion

Recipes for items pictured below are in the linked article





On the river, Chef Andrea Bopp wraps whole sweet Walla Walla onions in foil and tosses them into the coals of the campfire to roast and caramelize; here we’ve adapted his recipe for your home grill. Don’t skip the zippy honey-vinegar drizzle—it coaxes out even more flavor from the sweet onions and balances the blue cheese.


A thick paste of garlic, shallots, and herbs infuses this lamb with bold flavor; marinate overnight for best results. Don’t skip the Demi-Butter and the Balsamic Glaze; both recipes come together quickly, can be made ahead, and add game-changing flavor to this epic summer feast.


Hidden beneath a mound of juicy summer berries (Bopp uses native huckleberries, but blueberries are fine), a thin layer of sweetened sour cream crowns this luscious no-fuss cheesecake based on his great-grandmother’s recipe. Dollop the fluffy batter into the pan gently for the best results.




Homemade graham crackers add a deeper, almost caramel-like flavor to these addictive s’mores. Filled with the classic combo of marshmallow and chocolate squares, they get a drizzle of salted caramel for a decadent and gooey bite. Chef Bopp opts for drama and uses his kitchen torch to char the marshmallows; your oven’s broiler or a campfire will work just as well.

[oftpiste]

yum.

[KQ]

Walla Walla Valley Named Number One Wine Region in America




the Rotie Cellars Rocks Estate Vineyard

The Walla Walla Valley has just been named Best Wine Region in America in the USA Today 10Best Readers' Choice awards. Voting was open to the public online for the previous month and while Walla Walla has been a finalist in this poll twice before, this is the first time the region took home number one.

“I can think of no better way to honor wines from Washington state in general, and Walla Walla Valley wines specifically, than being recognized as America’s Best Wine Region by a vote of the public,” said Robert Hansen, executive director of the Walla Walla Valley Wine Alliance. “It’s a testament to the outstanding terroir, meticulous craftsmanship, and to the men and women who are committed to elevating the Walla Walla Valley from both a wine production and tourism perspective.”

Of our lovely Walla Walla, the article says: "Italian immigrants began growing wine grapes in Washington’s Walla Walla Valley in the 1850s. Today, this region features more than 100 wineries producing a range of varietals, most popularly Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Syrah, Cabernet Franc and Malbec. The American Viticultural Area spreads across the border into Oregon as well."

[Timberridge]

It could even widen its lead after Napa and Sonoma burn down.

[KQ]

It could even widen its lead after Napa and Sonoma burn down.

Last man standing?