Start of Day 4, The Oregon Coast

 The next day we woke up early to get on the road to the Oregon coast. We grabbed quick coffees from a walk-up Starbucks on our block and began our journey. We stopped at a tourist trap "Camp 18" for breakfast along the way which the guide books all praised. Without a doubt it was cool to see. A ton of old logging equipment was scattered on the grounds, and it is in the middle of the beautiful Northwest forests that put the white pines of New England to shame.

 A few months ago I showed this picture to my family and they just really didn't get it. Apparently either I have a poor sense of humor, or they do. I stand by this act of comedic brilliance.

 Check out the big smudge on my camera lens. Yeah... nothing like ruining a day's worth of pictures without realizing it. Luckily Kate is duplicating my efforts.

 Phyllis you are soooo cute. I know, the Fiat pictures must be getting old but I couldn't stop my self from snapping this shot. Beep beep!

 I've always thought chicken fried steak seemed like an incredibly gross concept so I've always mocked those who've ordered it, and avoided it like the plague. This place seemed like the type of joint that would specialize in it, so I decided to give it a whirl. As it turns out, my suspicions were justified. Nothing like seeing the snap of gristle when you cut you knife into the grade F (I assume) ground meat that is heavily battered and coated in grease and gravy. On the plus side the mashed potatoes and veggies weren't half bad, but this is one plate of food I did not finish.

I won't be posting for a few days because I'm off on a business trip. I'll be in the Galicia region of Spain till Friday. I know this probably sounds more interesting than the Pacific Northwest. Outside of having some nice meals in the evening it is going to be all work and no play. Here is a link to a couple blog entries I wrote years ago when I visited previously. Enjoy.
http://strollintheparks.blogspot.com/2009/09/vigo-spain-images.html

http://strollintheparks.blogspot.com/2009/09/more-vigo.html

The Epic End of Day III in the Northwest

 Some more Mount Rainier National Park photos. It was an awesome day, certainly one of the more beautiful places I've been to. Check out the waterfall off in the distance. We could see this from a roadside overlook, and shortly after we hiked down to the beautiful little set of falls below. It was a little later on in the day and I think we were both marginally concerned about the onset of dusk as we hiked. There was one other set of hikers on the trail, a set of young twenty somethings, two girls and a guy. There was a couple and the other was clearly a third wheel, and she had decided not to follow the love birds down to the bottom, so we saw her headed back up as we hiked down, even though that group had probably advanced 10 minutes ahead of us. All of this gave us a weird sense of urgency and we rushed up and down the trail.

 The gorge pictured here was pretty spectacular. This was another short hike, probably a mile round trip where you walk along the top of the gorge over and then back down the other side. I was trying to find the name of this attraction, but so far after the time it has escaped my mind and I was having a little difficulty making much sense of the maps I Googled.

 This I believe is the view of the gorge from the road. I feel like a punch line, some distant person you don't know showing you a boring set of slides. And below, here's Kate on a trail.

 Here's Kate on a bridge. Ha-ha! The sign actually explains that only one person should be on this bridge at a time, which of course made me bounce merrily across it because I'm a knuckle dragging mouth breathing fool. No, I'm not joking, at least not about the mouth breathing.

 Here's Kate taking a picture of the river which you'll probably get to see later. I know you can't wait but try to scroll down slowly.

 I am the Kate the Great and I will smote thee as I flair my nostrils. Muhahahahaha!

 Taking these weird tree shots was Kate's idea, it involved lying down on the ground to get the height of the great giants in the frame. Yes. There were ants. But there were also mosquitoes at the higher elevations so either way. Insects. What are you going to do.

 Dude... these trees are like totally radical man. Righteous!

 Look, vacation just makes me shine with roly poly jolliness. That, and late night snacks. I was probably thinking about eating some late night snacks in this shot. Mmmmm salsa.

 Kate, I've got this great idea, I'll look like I'm holding up this massive tree! Totally original right? Damn I'm so creative I could just pee myself in excitement.

 I know, I know.. why the hell are you seeing this bridge again? Well smart ass, I have to go back out the way I came in, so there.

 Kate's photo from earlier. Worth it!

At the end of day three we made it to Portland where we stayed at the Shilo Inn "Rose Garden" in Portland. This place was ridiculous. I mean it was comfortable but it was the weirdest clash of patterns old and modern furniture, dated decor. Quite frankly it was fantastic in its total lack of effort to really look appropriate. It was trying to be funky, it was probably trying to be normal, but it so clearly was not. 

When we arrived some older couple in there 60s was checking in with their 90 year old father who they got a separate room for. What happened was straight out of a Woody Allen movie, I was getting frustrated and losing hair just being near them. Despite the wait, coping with my cramped legs and sore feet, it almost was worth it because they were unintentionally hilarious, as was the super-pierced and tattooed stoner chick with a really bad cold that was working the desk. The wife was a complete drama queen, she looked a little like Jerry Seinfeld's mom from the sitcom, and the husband looked like Larry David. We watched as she passively aggressively made comments as the husband checked in, and as she asked whether he did something seconds he actually did. It was painful and pleasurable all at the same time. Like a live version of real awkward moment from "The Office" happening right in front of us. We learn that they are from New York, and somewhere in the middle of this show the man asks where the nearest bar is. As soon as they are done checking in, and as soon as Gramps had been brought out to his room the couple steps outside as we take a big sigh and try to check in. But it wasn't over, as I'm about to speak we hear the we the wife lay down napalm of the harshest bile mother f-ing language I've ever heard, right out side the door. There were c-words of both varieties laid down among all of the other normal garden variety swears. It was a potty mouth masterpiece and we all stood there slack jawed, totally aware of why this dude had been desperate to find his way to the bar. 

So we check in, and as we head back to the room the woman in front of us fell down the stairs (retrospectively I wonder if she had been knocking back the sauce on the ride there). Kate and I rushed to help her up, Kate offered to take her bags up to the next floor as there was no elevator. She crankily brushes us off. 

I won't go into too much detail but there was also a whole fiasco where our room keys wouldn't work. The other couple is going through the same thing. I also neglected to mention the part where the dopey check in gal mentions how the Shilo Inn only served vegan creamer at their continental breakfast because they don't have a Portland issued permit to dump dairy products down the drain. I'm not sure on the validity of her beliefs, but it was hysterical listening to the old guy mutter about how he had entered into "Portlandia." 

The concierge girl proceeded to drop the "Oh it's because they are from New York," on us after they moved on, to which Kate responded "I'm from New York."

Anyway, we went to McDonalds for dinner which was awful. (shocker) As we settled in to the Shilo later, later Kate went out to get ice or something and she saw the old couple come back from the bar across the street all tipsy and happy. A fitting end to our third adventurous day.

NW Day III part 2

 She'll be coming down the mountain....

 Anyone up for a swim?

 Sexy selfie... holy baldness Batman!

 Nyeah!

 Nyeah! Nyeah!

Tomorrow I'll write some substance as I cover some new territory!

The Beginning of NW Vacation Day III

In the morning we left early to get to the airport where I picked up a rental car. Surprisingly they stuck me with a Fiat, which really surprised me. Typically I always end up with your standard Chevy Cruz or something in that class. The Fiat was fine really, and when we went to Portland eventually when we hung out with Jason we remained in the city so no driving was necessary. If we had to use the back seat, it may have been OK for small distances. It was fun to drive, and it had a huge sun/moon roof which was a nice feature so no complaints. It just made the trip more memorable.

Our trek on this day took us to Mt. Rainier National Park, and we began by heading to the Copper Creek Inn for lunch. The food was pretty good, nothing memorable, but the location and the restaurant itself was. I'd recommend stopping here over the National Park cafeteria to anyone that goes.

This was a view at a stop off early in the National Park.

We hiked a little bit here, but there was still a lot of snow and we weren't equipped so we did not go too far.

I've made the photo above into my cover page on facebook. You can barely make me out heading off into the evergreens. It sort of makes me think of life, a trek off into the wilderness, and I don't know about you but sometime it seems like you are definitely on your own. I know I'm not.... but well, it's complicated what can I say.

Me and Phyllis, what I affectionately named the Fiat.

End of Day 2 Seattle

 Out of all of the days of the trip, this one in particular destroyed me. To say that we over did it with the walking is an understatement. We didn't really capture in pictures, but from Volunteer Park, where I last left off, we walked to the University district. Keep in mind we had already walked from downtown Seattle to Volunteer Park. By the time we had reached the University of Washington, it didn't take too much convincing to hop on a bus to get to Fremont. We got some advice from a woman at a bus stop and got off of the Fremont Ave. stop off of 45th street. Fremont is a great neighborhood, even if it is one of those pretentious our crap doesn't stink sort of neighborhood. Tons of little out of the way stores and sandwich shops scattered about over peaceful suburbia with a distinct bohemian undercurrent.

 There is a lot of interesting public art in Fremont. This was an interesting piece where two separate statutes where intended to appear as though they were on television when you looked at it from the correct vantage point. We ate lunch near here at Blue Moon burgers which is a Seattle based joint with three locations. It prides itself on having local, natural ingredients, and the fries and burgers certainly hit the spot.

Some of the interesting art in Fremont is "The Fremont Troll," located appropriately under a bridge. Check out the link which talks about its construction. In the troll's left hand is a VW bug, and it is an actual VW bug.

 The statue of Lenin is interesting and controversial. I wanted to pose with it but unfortunately there were some activists trying to get people to sign some petition and they were directly beneath it. Ironically I'm quite certain it was for a cause that probably had more allegiance with Lenin's views than opposition. Thankfully somewhere along the way someone had the foresight to paint Lenin's hands red to represent blood. Maybe the petition was to clean his hands.... I didn't approach the Che' look-a-like to find out.

The missle seen here in a couple of photos was once intended to deliver a nuclear payload. It is now attached to a Fremont bar.

I actually had a few photos of the hedge dinosaur below. It needed some TLC. Blogger has been having some issues and in my frustration organizing this I ended up deleting the photos. You are not missing much. I suggested here that Kate should pose as though she was being eaten. I know.... I know, needs work. You can see an eye on the head looking at her if you scrutinize it closely.

After exploring Fremont and getting thoroughly sun burnt (there is a story to that involving organic sun-block from a whole foods type store, the only place in Fremont I could find, and passing by youngsters with petitions multiple times. Apparently Kate & I do not care about women's health. We are jerks) we walked back up to 45th street. I found a Mom & Pop store where I scored not only some real sun block, but some fantastic sparkling lemonade that really hit the spot. On 45th we picked up our bus and headed to our next destination, the Chittenden Locks, where we saw salmon through a great viewing window.

The locks from the surface, we watched a couple boats pass through, kind of envious of the navigators' day on the water.

Blogger was giving me problems on this post. I actually started writing this several days ago but gave up when I was accidentally deleting photos and repeatedly getting them out of order. These pictures are from Discovery Park, which is an enormous untamed park. Many hiking paths, bike paths and dirt roads traverse this park, and it is home to Discovery Lighthouse, which we rushed to get to. The sun was setting fast, and between the emerging mosquitoes and a limited bus schedule we did not want to be too long!

We were pretty excited to see this, the first really good glimpse of Mount Rainier. It was surprisingly dominant in the skyline and we were thrilled to be in town on such a beautiful day.

Back in the city we ended up going to "Serious Pie," a great little "hip" pizza joint not to far from the hotel that had a nice atmosphere. Apparently it is one of these trendy famous-chef establishments with locations across the U.S., which had I know I may have avoided it. Regardless, ignorance was bliss and I enjoyed the meal, eating most of my pie and part of Kate's (oink oink). You can see the sun damage done in this photo! We were eager to collapse after this, exhausted after a productive day of urban exploration.