Ashland

Ashland is a thoroughly charming place: a small town and culturally sophisticated destination spot. Occupying a corner in the gentle Rogue River Valley, it is protected between the magnificent Siskiyou and Cascade mountain ranges. It’s conveniently located only 15 miles south of the Medford/Rogue Valley International Airport, served by both United Airlines and Horizon Air, and is an easy 5½- to 6-hour drive north from San Francisco, or 4 to 5 hours south from Portland via I-5. You’ll have no trouble finding stellar accommodations in this town—it’s where some of Oregon’s finest inns are located. We were hard pressed to end our listings where we did! This is a walking town, to be sure. Take all the time you want to discover parks, bookstores, cafés, boutique shops, and galleries. The gem that is the Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF), located at 15 S. Pioneer Street, is not to be missed. Operating nine months of the year (from February through October, with the outdoor theater open from June), OSF presents both classic and contemporary plays in repertory, using Shakespeare as its standard. Plays are performed most days of the week in three theaters simultaneously: the contemporary Angus Bowmer (named after the drama professor who started the festival in 1935), the intimate Black Swan, and the open-air Elizabethan Theatre, designed to look like England’s fine old Globe Theater. Since the festival is enormously popular, performances sell out months in advance. Don’t let that discourage you from showing up even at the last minute, however. Some of our best success stories occurred when we arrived at the box office on the morning or the evening of a performance, taking advantage of the inevitable cancellations and no-shows. The Festival Box Office is very professionally run—let the folks who work there give you tips on how to increase your chances of getting in at the last minute. (Open Monday from 9:30 am to 5 pm, and Tuesday to Sunday from 9:30 am to 8:30 pm; 541-482-4331, www.osfashland.org.) Many inns are within easy walking distance of the festival grounds and the downtown area, so park your car once, pick up an OSF schedule, and revel in all you can accomplish on foot! A wonderful variety of extra activities are scheduled at OSF every week: backstage tours (this is especially fun at the Elizabethan Theatre), informal chats with the actors, lectures by the directors or “dramaturgs,” and in summer, an always-enchanting pre-performance show in the main courtyard. At the corner of Pioneer and East Main you’ll find the Festival Exhibit Center, showcasing costumes, props, audio and video footage from the earliest performances, and over 60 years of photographs. (Open Tuesday to Sunday from 10:30 am to 1:30 pm, mid-February to October.) Directions to the OSF grounds: Coming from the north on Main Street, turn right on Pioneer. From the south, take Siskiyou Blvd, which veers right to become Lithia Way as it nears the festival grounds. Turn left on Pioneer. Lithia Park occupies about 100 acres adjacent to the Shakespeare Festival grounds. It’s a lovely place to stroll between shows. Notice the drinking fountains in Lithia Plaza, which is surrounded by restaurants and shops, but be careful which fountain you choose for a drink! Some produce a sulfurous, lithium-laden mineral water that bubbles up just east of the city, and it’s definitely an acquired taste. Early Ashlanders had hoped to build a world-class spa around the local lithium springs, but the idea never quite took off. There are many excellent delis and bakeries in town, perfect for stocking up on picnic fare. Ask your innkeeper for recommendations. Chateaulin Fine Wines & Gourmet Foods, for example, presents a marvelous high-end assortment of pâtés, cheeses, and wines. It’s located at 50 E. Main Street next to Chateaulin Restaurant Français. (Open daily from 11 am to 6 pm.) Now ranking number ten of the “Best Small Art Towns in America” according to the Ashland Gallery Association (AGA), Ashland boasts an intriguing assortment of art galleries. First Friday Gallery Walking Tours (from 5 to 8 pm on the first Friday of every month) are becoming more and more popular, as is the annual Taste of Ashland Walking Tour in spring. You can meet artists in a casual atmosphere while sampling a local red from the Rogue Valley’s best wineries as you amble through galleries downtown and in the Historic Railroad District. Phone the AGA at 877-752-6278 for details. The city is also very proud of its Schneider Museum of Art on the University of Southern Oregon campus. Facilities include four small galleries where a broad range of exhibitions is presented. (1250 Siskiyou Blvd; open from 10 am to 4 pm Tuesday to Saturday; and till 7 pm on the first Friday of each month; 541-552-6245, www.sou.edu/schneider.html.) The Ashland area is one of the oldest wine-producing regions in the western U.S., a history that began as far back as the 1840s when immigrant Italians and Swiss, fresh off the Oregon Trail, decided to grow grapes and bottle wine here. Today, the Rogue Valley, where hot days and cool nights create the perfect climate for Bordeaux varietals, produces some excellent red wines.