The Second Annual Mixology event will blockade three blocks of Minnesota Avenue, filling the street with booths from a few dozen distilleries and providing three fully staffed bars with some of the sharpest bartenders in the region. But this is not Mardi Gras (leave the beads at home, hussie); a satellite to Bite of Bend, […]
Section Feature
Posted inCulture
Endless Canvas
The undercover artists behind the Greenwood Street Gallery
Write a friend’s phone numbers on your arm and give them a blank check for bail, just in case. That’s what multi media artist J.F., a thirty-something ex-Miami resident, tells me and a group of a half dozen eager Bend artists outside Thump Coffee. J.F. is a street artist who has lived in Bend for […]
Posted inNews
Making Room for Art
Should a tourism tax fund arts and culture?
In terms of public spending, Bend’s arts community is like the kid who, perhaps unfairly, is picked last when teams are chosen for the recess kickball game. Which is strange considering the important role arts play in the region. Think concerts at the Tower Theatre, First Friday, roundabout art. Yet, as far as public funding […]
Posted inOutside
Hiking for a Higher Cause
Could a desert trek save Oregon’s wilderness?
It’s 9 a.m. and Sage Clegg is already worried about where her water is going to come from. She’s worried because she’s in the Central Oregon desert, it’s hot and, later in the day, she plans to walk across an extended section of dusty, exposed flats. The day before, at Sand Springs, she enjoyed refreshingly […]
Posted inMusic
Outdoor Vibes
Two camping music festival options. Two very different experiences.
Healing Powers: The two-day Coyote Spirit Festival in the south-central Oregon town of Paisley, is as much a therapeutic treatment as it is a camping music festival. Set among the reportedly healing waters of Summer Lake Hot Springs and featuring a venue called “The Devotional Dome,” the Coyote Spirit Festival blends hoovy-groovy things like laughter […]
Posted inMusic
Journey to the Orient
MarchFourth Marching Band fill unlikely role as U.S. ambassadors to China
Forget about Dennis Rodman’s goodwill tour of North Korea; that was nothing more than tabloid fodder. Portland’s giant marching band MarchFourth (M4) just returned to the states after completing a two-week U.S. State Department-sponsored exchange to improve relations with China. As unconventional as it may seem to have an American marching band playing at universities […]
Posted inSpecial Issues & Guides
Summer Guide!
My First: Camp
My dad is an ear, nose and throat doctor. I have a certain pride in him and his work. My sister even followed in his footsteps; I refer to her as the heir to the allergy empire. But the respect for doctors—in particular allergists—did not start well. When I was 4 years old—about the same […]
Posted inMusic
Poncho or Cowboy Hat?
Tremoloco brings a blender of border music
Not every Tremoloco song requires bi-lingual ears, but for tracks like “Temo” and “La Lechuza” it sure helps. The seven band members of the Tex-Mex band from Los Angeles play guitar-esque instruments with names like the “requinto romantic” (a high-pitched acoustic guitar) and the jarana (a Spanish ukulele). Singer-guitarist Tony Zamora has played with Los […]
Posted inSpecial Issues & Guides
Saddle Up
Rodeo Season Means Summertime
This past March, I traveled with my New York niece and nephew to a massive rodeo in San Antonio, Texas. It was a dusty, sprawling affair, and I was probably the only one not wearing cowboy boots. To gear up the Upper East Side kids and better blend into the central Texas crowd, we stopped […]
Posted inOutside
Horsin’ Around
Central Oregon’s top riding destinations
Bend’s Suzi Lewis, 56 years young, knows horses. She has been riding horses since she was 8—all over the U.S.—and has been giving lessons to aspiring Central Oregon trail riders for decades. So when she called Central Oregon "one of the best places to own and ride a horse,” I took her words as gospel. […]
