Bend, OR

Three times this summer, you can get your French fix at Pomegranate Home and Garden’s French Flea Market, an event where local artists and antique dealers peddle unique and beautiful wares in the shop’s charming courtyard. Located on the outskirts of the Shopko Shopping Center, Pomegranate Home and Garden is Bend’s purveyor of shabby chic home wares, letterpress stationary, fancy French soaps, and treasures for the garden.

I headed over to the second summer flea market a couple Saturdays ago where a dozen vendors were selling furniture, art, French knick knacks like signs that say “bain” and “chambre,” Eiffel Tower inspired jewelry, vintage clothing, antique buttons and more. I enjoyed milling about the grounds, looking at trinkets and exploring Pomegranate’s pleasant shop, which is housed in an old wood-shingled split level building. A separate shed-like structure accommodates the garden part of the home and garden shop.

Even though the nearest beach is more than 150 miles away, Bend residents don’t seem to notice. When the weather warms up, the Deschutes River fills in for our ocean and Farewell Bend Park becomes our beach. During the summer months, Farewell Bend Park fills with sunbathers, beach cruiser bicycles, playing children, and droves of river floaters clumsily hauling inflatable mats and inner tubes.

Farewell Bend Park offers 22 acres of tidy paths, big grassy areas, picnic tables, a playground, and brilliant views of the Deschutes River and the abutting marshy areas. I pass the park, which stretches alongside Reed Market Road, nearly every day, and look forward to the view–a layered panorama of snow-capped mountains, evergreens, the sparkling Deschutes and grassy fields– every time.

Comfy, funky and a bit like hanging out in your bohemian aunt’s uptown loft, Townshend’s is a spot of hip and cozy sophistication in downtown Bend. The décor, a cushy mix of candy-colored couches, dark wood and brick, is as inviting as the spicy aroma that clouds your head as you walk into the Bond Street shop. The loose-leaf menu is a 12-page tea volume, with 84 varieties of green, white, black, oolong, chai, rooibos, máte, and herbal teas. All loose-leaf teas are available hot or iced in 3 different sizes, including a pot to share among friends. Townshend’s also serves tea lattes and bubble tea, a sweet creamy tea with tapioca balls that you suck up through a special wide straw.