Category: seattlepi.com teaser headlines   In the middle of Oregon, Bend is a town of seeming contradictions. It’s a mountain town…on the edge of a desert. It logs an average of 300 days a year of sun…in Oregon. Bend’s quirky polarity is one of the many reasons why the town is so lovable; it’s the…

WHERE: Sequim. WHY: For the Olympic Peninsula BirdFest, April 9–11 (olympicbirdfest.org). The coastline, estuaries and rivers of the Olympic Peninsula make excellent birding grounds, especially this month as flocks of Townsend’s warblers, short-billed dowitchers and Cassin’s vireos migrate north. FLIGHT PLAN: BirdFest offers bird-inspired art, lectures, guided walks and bird-watching boat trips—including a three-day cruise…