Bright Foliage at Berkeley

Bright foliage was everywhere in the streets of the city of Berkeley in late November. There were more varieties of colors as well, red, orange, brown and bright yellow here than in Portland. Even under gloomy rainy sky they were eye catching. 

The blue sky of the sunny day (November 23) after extended rainy days, made the colors brighter, the foliage more beautiful.

The day ended with a splendid sunset glow.

bright colors in the raining morning 

the sunshine and blue sky made everything more beautiful 

Ginkgo leaves

yellow rose ar Berkeley rose garden 

maple trees

sunset glow over bay area 

Latourell Falls along Columbia River Gorge

Latourell Falls is a waterfall along the Columbia River Gorge in Oregon, just outside Portland, within Guy W. Talbot State Park. Latourell is unique among the best-known Columbia Gorge waterfalls, in the way that it drops straight down from an overhanging basalt cliff.

I went there on November 17, 2024, a cloudy day with occasional light rains. It was early in the morning, I decent from parking lot to the bottom of the Latourell falls through a narrow trail. I was the only person at the lower Latourell Falls at the time, enjoyed the foliage in solitude. I took selfies using a small tripod. The color was dominantly yellow, with spotted red and brown. A few minutes later, a couple with their daughter, came by, and the mother volunteered to take pictures of me in front of the falls. They marched on, and I lingered a bit longer. 

One thing I noticed was the moss on tree trunks, just like in tropical areas, like we observed at South island of New Zealand . The moist for moss to grow there comes from the mist of the water falls.

the lower Latourell Falls

Latourell Creek Bridge

Trail by the creek

Latourell Bridge

moss on trees by the Latourell Falls

Mist from lower Latourell Falls

I did not know that there is loop trail around the water falls, which goes from the lower falls to upper falls. I walked back to the parking lot and climbed the hill from the trailhead at the parking lot to get to the upper falls. The trail is narrow and the fallen leaves and saturated soil made the trail slippery. 

Again I was the only person on the trail, all the way to the upper trail. The upper falls is much shorter than lower falls, otherwise they are very similar. I saw the mist from lower falls from above, and I saw some birds in the bushes and trees.

I encountered several groups on the decent, retraced my uphill hike, a group of 3 young men, likely high school students or college students, a father with 2 girls, a middle aged couple.

It took me about 1 hour to complete the 2 mile up and down trek. 

Upper Latourell Falls

foliage at Latourell Falls

My track at Latourell Falls

Glimpse of Portland Oregon

I  went to Portland. Oregon for a technical conference from Monday to Thursday this week.

As my plane was landing last Saturday morning, I noticed the colors of the foliage despite the gloomy sky.

I walked to river front parks on the west bank of  Willamette River in the light rain, after checking in to my hotel.  The foliage amazed me...bright, colorful, along streets, by the water front. A large flock of geeses were foraging in the lawn, gulls lazily spread around. 

As the Willamette River divided Portland into two parts, west, and east. There are many bridges over the river, somewhat similar to Pittsburgh. As one can tell from the bridges and buildings, Portland is an old city. In fact, it was incorporated in 1751, 173 years ago. 

pedestrian bridge at river level 

the green towers are where the Oregon Convention center is

the sky turned sunny, briefly on my last day at Portland 

Portland art museum is only 0.2 miles away from the hotel I stayed. I didn't get time to visit it, but did see murals in the streets, and even in hotel rooms. There are a few sculptures outside and inside the Convention center.

Sculpture in front of the Convention Center 

decorations inside the Convention center 

the sister bell

a swing 

a dragon boat

street mural 

paintings in the guest room

sculptures in the water front park

The streets are narrow,  parking is expensive, and the public transportation is pretty good. Frequent buses cover the whole downturn area well. The bus toll is quite expensive though, $2.8 dollar for 1.4 miles. I actually rode on the buses a few times, using the bus pass issued by the conference. 

The sad thing about this city, is the sizable homeless population.  I saw many at river front parks, and on some streets. I could smell Marijuana in many public places, such as elevators in the hotel, in streets ... not a surprise because it is legal to consume Marijuana in Oregon. For the time I was at Portland,  and the places I visited around downtown, I didn't feel unsafe, 

A Tangled Tale

We bought this ring and rope wooden puzzle years ago when we visited Johnson Space center at Houston. The goal of the puzzle is to move the metal ring from left at the blue ball, through a tangled rope, to the left at the yellow ball, as shown in the photo above. During that trip we also bought a mysterious toy "Space Force".

I tried a few times to solve the puzzle with no success. I also searched the internet for the solution to the puzzle, found a written instruction, still could not solve the puzzle. It has been on the top of our large bookshelf since.

Last Sunday, I happened to watch a video from science.com about solving topology related puzzles.... This video illustrated the basic approach of solving a seemingly impossible puzzle easily through topology consideration.

It aroused my interests in solving the rope and ring wooden puzzle on top of my bookshelf.

So I looked at the puzzle again...

Through Google lens, I found that the wooden puzzle is named tangled tale wooden puzzle. I also found a Youtube video to show how to solve it.

Despite watching the video to see the step by step , I couldn't follow because I did not know the goal or why the person made the moves.

I asked Lily to give it a try since she is a hands-on person. She watched, and tried a few times...finally solved it

I  watched her solving it, step by step, made good suggestions during the process.

When I tried to solve it, I  still couldn't solve it

I had a discussion with her, and figured out the specific goals and the characteristics of the key step:

1) obviously the metal ring can not pass the wooden rings

2) section of the rope can move through the wooden rings

3) so the focus is on how to make the rope move around the wooden and metal rings to provide the escape route - like the simpler puzzle shown in scoence.com video. 

Finally I moved the ring from left to right, and the did the reverse.  I could solve it consistently!

We had a great time to solve this puzzles for a couple of hours.

the ring at the start position

The ring is moved to the second position, on the rope between and 1st and 2nd wood ring

The ring is moved to the third position, on the rope between and 2nd and 3rd wood ring

puzzle solved!

Notes

For difficult/complex problems, when they are solved by others, we need to understand and practice the process to make it our own. So we can solve the problem and similar problems on our own.

Sometimes,  some impossible problems actually are possible.  but there are problems that have no solution.

One may try this site to buy the tangled tale wooden puzzle  https://www.puzzlemaster.ca/browse/wood/woodpuzzlemaster/17-tangled-tales