Day 3: Ashland, Oregon - June 17

Having tickets to an afternoon matinee at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, OR (about three hours away) meant hitting the road quite early this morning. But, we also needed to take a walk around Manzanita Lake before we left.  We packed up the car and went around the lake before most of the campground was awake.  The lake itself was pretty but when we got half-way around and could look back on Mt. Lassen as a backdrop, it was breathtakingly beautiful. 

Rather than take the slightly shorter route through Redding, we traveled to Ashland via the mountain road.  We stopped along the way at Subway Caves – a lava tube.  It was really long,  pitch black (hence no pictures) and a little creepy once inside, giving me the chance to practice my great parenting technique of dealing with my own fears by saying things to make the girls (primarily aimed at Julia) more scared.  It never fails!   

Along the road we were treated to wonderful views of Mt. Shasta and guitar music courtesy of Rachel.

We reached Ashland with time to get lunch before the show and headed to our accommodations for the night – Anne Hathaway’s B&B.  Our room wasn’t ready but I asked for a place to change out of camping clothes into theater clothes and the nice man checking us in decided to give me a great room upgrade.  I never saw the room I had paid for, but I can tell you the room we got is significantly nicer. 

We walked from the B&B to the theater, stopping for lunch at a little café.  We saw a wonderful production of Much Ado About Nothing – a very diverse cast recreating the play in the modern era.  We had seen a top-notch production of the play at the Globe Theater in London, but this one was just as spectacular (maybe even more so?).   Afterwards we went to matinee discussion led by the fabulous actor that played Beatrice to get clarity on the staging of the ending.  Their feminist revision of the ending and fantastic physical comedy led to lots of interesting discussion (debate?) for several hours.

We walked back through probably the nicest public park I've seen and stopped in at the local music store and art center - something for everyone.  Dinner was in a home converted into an Italian restaurant a few doors down from our B&B - absolutely delicious!