We recently bought a weekend home that is only 2.5 hours drive away from us, but seems like a different world once you cross over the Cascade Mountain passes. We live during the week in the land of clouds and rain and on the weekends we go to the sun.... we are outdoor people for sure. Last weekend we snowshoed both Saturday and Sunday and the high temp was 18F. Back here at our weekday home it was mid 30s, but rain, rain, rain. The summers on this side of the state are spectacular, but the winters are dreary. One good thing about living in the Willamette Valley of Oregon is that a couple of hours either way makes you feel like you are in a new place --- the coast one way, the high desert the other - in the middle is the green of the valley.