I had hoped to get up to Eugene to catch up with Kelly who is one of the people, originally from Minnesota, who studied with me in Lismore. Unfortunately she was working the day that we would be going through. She had some great suggestions about hot springs in that area but we had a long day of driving so unfortunately couldn’t really go that far out of our way to check them out.
The drive up through the Sierras was beautiful. We drove up 44 to 89 to 5, past Mount Shasta. The woods were beautiful and we did a lot of climbing and descending (as we have many times this trip). Even 5 was really niece. It was pretty straight but went through valleys full of evergreens. The coolest thing by far that happened is we saw a bobcat. It was running all out across the road. It was pretty awesome. Like a big really muscly house-cat.
We got to Portland around 4 and drove straight to the restaurant that we had chosen for dinner - Pok-pok. It was a Vietnamese place that had covered outdoor setaing so we sat outside. It was awesome. And nice that it was covered because it was pouring. They didn’t serve their dinner menu until 5 so we got a beer and some award-winning chicken wings which were amazing. It was interesting how they did them as well, they didn’t separate the top part from the bottom part so each wing was the entire wing. We all got different dinner dishes after 5 each of which was great.
From there we found our hotel and checked in. I had booked it on Priceline, which I had never used before. We got a good deal for the doubletree but only ended up with a queen bed (when I was booking it it said that the room was only guaranteed to sleep 2 people, so we couldn’t gotten lucky with two doubles or something, but didn’t). From the hotel we checked out the internet in the Lobby to see where Amnesia Brewery was (something that had been recommended by a few different people).
It was 2 ½ miles away on the same side of the river. It was a little bit rainy but we decided to walk it anyway. So we walked there while it was still light and got to see some of the residential parts (not the city center, officially North Portland, I think). And walked back in the dark. A pretty good walk and much longer would have been too long. The brewery was fun. It’s a big warehouse type building where they brew beer in the back and have a bar/food in front with picnic tables. The beer was great and we tried a few kinds. There was a Blazers game going on which had a bunch of people there watching it. When we got there it was really close, by the end there were only a few people left watching and they were down by a fair margin.
We walked back a different way than we walked there which turned out to be a great thing. We stopped outside a bar that had a trio playing by the front window. A girl said, “you guys can come in” which was pretty obvious I guess but was enough for us to check it out. They were awesome. They were playing folk music to a captive audience. We got a drink and sat and watched the end of their performance. The restaurant was a pizza restaurant so afterwards we grabbed a slice for the walk back to the hotel. When we got a few blocks from the hotel it really started pouring so by the time we got back to the hotel we all had soaked bottom halves (the top halves were protected by raincoats).
The next morning on our way out we went to Voodoo doughnuts thanks to Man vs Food re-run that we saw in San Simeon. The doughnuts were great but unfortunately they were out of the bacon maple which is the one we were most interested in trying. We ended up with one voodoo doughnut (shaped like a man, raspberry filled, chocolate frosted and a pretzel stuck through the heart) and an old dirt bastard (doughnut with oreo on top and peanut butter drizzle). Outside the shop there were a lot of people begging. There was a guy right in front of the door and a girl who asked to borrow one of our cell phones “to call her mom”. I’m not sure if she was going to take it, or call someone sketchy but we said sorry. There was also a woman in a bathrobe and a cane who was either yelling terrorist or having it yelled at her by the other vagrants. That’s one thing that I really don’t like about cities. I like the idea of helping people out but really really don’t like being accosted for money. I feel bad saying no. Or not saying anything at all as people have advised me to do.
Caleb had his heart set on biscuits and gravy so stop # 2 was Pine State Biscuit. Dan and I split a biscut and gravy, too. He was determined to rectify his bad first impression of them that he had gotten in Florida. Luckily it worked. Biscuits and Gravy are awesome. We chose shitake and that was definitely the right choice. Unfortunately I was pretty full already from the doughnut so only had a few mouthfuls. Later on I was wishing that we had gotten a second just to take with us for later.
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