Wednesday, June 29, 2005


Street Scene. Nice, huh? Posted by Hello


Powell's Bookstore. The interior is *much* more interesting. Posted by Hello


Courthouse square. See the guy in the overalls? He was "preaching" a couple hours earlier at the farmers market, too. We're all going to hell, I guess..... Posted by Hello


A street fountain. Water, water, everywhere.... Posted by Hello


The Farmer's Market - a small slice of it, anyway. 50 vendors, perhaps? Posted by Hello

Riding the Brown Beaver

also know as Tri-Met Bus 19. Hey, I didn't name it - that's what it's called! What were *you* thinking I meant?

Since I've been in town for a bit over a week, and the weather was supposed to be great, it was time to venture downtown. The bus route is less than a block from the house, and cheap ($1.40 each way), so it only made sense. Stephanie gave me a route map, some pointers, and off I went. I hopped off downtown, and walked up to (one of) the farmers market(s). Cool. A mix of produce and other food items. Wow. I sampled som ranier cherries, and had to get some to snack on. Niiiice. I also got a sausage roll, and a soda, and stopped to eat & watch the world. Pretty cool, so far.

The Portland Library's main branch was only a couple of blocks away, so I stopped there to read a couple magazines, and got a book on business card designs. Not terribly exciting, I know, but I want to put some cards together......

After that I wandered a bit, and stopped by Courthouse Square. What a great space. It's smaller than I remembered. Lots of people out having lunch & enjoying the sun on the steps.

I wantered a bit more, then headed over to Powell's Books. http://www.powells.com/ What an amazing place. I could spend days, and thousands of dollars, if I had the opportunity! Not having the funds, I limited myself to browsing the architecture/planning/landscape sections, then getting a Portland map. Wow, I've been needing one of those. It'll make navigating this city *much* easier.

Time to head home. Just find the 19 bus again, right? Probably. That's not what *I* did, though. I caught the 19 bus going the wrong direction. After a few miles, I realized I was heading someplace other than home. Poop. Time to look at the system map I'd grabbed earlier. Sure enough, I was headed NE instead of SE. I could have simply gotten off, but that seemed too easy. Instead, I hopped off, grabbed the 75 bus headed south, then the 19 bus headed west. Sounds confusing, and it was, a bit. Still, I made it home, and even had an interesting conversation with someone as we waited for the 75 bus.

Lesson learned.

Sunday, June 26, 2005

Oh Happy Day

Well, I finally have an internet connection at home. High-speed, to boot. I'm so happy. (It's amazing the little things in life that makes us happy, isn't it?) It's via a comcast (boo) cable modem (double boo) but there weren't that many options out here. Oh, well. At least I'm on-line again, without having to resort to the library or a coffee-shop.

No super changes. I've survived my first week in Portland, and I like it as much as I thought I would. Yay! I'm slowly getting my room set up - the painting is done, made some curtains, put shelves in the closet. I still need to find/make a desk and shelves, but that will come with time. The desk would be nice, though.

I also need to set up a wireless network for the house, so I can share the connection (and cost) with Stephanie. I'm hoping that will be fairly painless. Otherwise, I know a computer geek that will be getting a call! (Hello, Gary!)

I registered for classes at Portland Community College (www.pcc.edu) - I'm taking watercolor painting, HTML/Web Page Design, and a Photoshop class later this summer. Should keep me off the streets...... I also had an introduction to yoga. I liked it, and will probably try to keep going. It'd be nice to get into better shape, and yoga could help nicely. The fact that the classes are mainly women is only icing on the cake!

Well, time to head out. Ya'll take care.

B

Sunday, June 19, 2005


Here's the commercial street one block over. The next couple of blocks have the nicer shops and whatnot... Posted by Hello


A view of the street in front of the house. Some traffic, but not too bad. Posted by Hello


Here's the house. The driveway may be a bit interesting on a motorcycle..... Posted by Hello


Further down the gorge. The vegetation reflects the greater rain.... Posted by Hello


One of my early views of the gorge. Other than the river, it's *real* dry. Posted by Hello


Western Oregon, coming down from the mountains. You can see the interstate winding down, and heading straight at the bottom. Posted by Hello


Here's my route from Boise to Portland. Posted by Hello

Home (for a while)

Finding a place to live was a leap of faith. I posted on craigslist portland what I was looking for, and Stephanie contacted me - after some email and telephone conversations, we bouth though it would work out. It seems we were right. I think it'll be a great place to live while I'm in Portland. It's in SE Portland, in a nice older neighborhood. Walking distance to lots of shops/eateries/grocery/etc, on a couple bus routes, and easy to get downtown.

Stephaine doesn't have a car, so the driveway and garage are mine to use for the PPZJ (Pimpin' Purple ZJ, aka grand cherokee), trailer, and motorcycles.

Right now we're painting my bedroom, but I should be settling in within the next couple of days.

I think it'll work just fine.

Home (for a while)

Finding a place to live was a leap of faith. I posted on craigslist portland what I was looking for, and Stephanie contacted me - after some email and telephone conversations, we bouth though it would work out. It seems we were right. I think it'll be a great place to live while I'm in Portland. It's in SE Portland, in a nice older neighborhood. Walking distance to lots of shops/eateries/grocery/etc, on a couple bus routes, and easy to get downtown.

Stephaine doesn't have a car, so the driveway and garage are mine to use for the PPZJ (Pimpin' Purple ZJ, aka grand cherokee), trailer, and motorcycles.

Right now we're painting my bedroom, but I should be settling in within the next couple of days.

I think it'll work just fine.

Made it to Portland!

The weather on Friday was looking pretty crappy throughout the entire northwest, so rather than camping, I headed straight to Portland. Took I-84 all the way. Not a bad drive. *Eastern* (Thanks Tracy!) Oregon really *is* pretty desolate. Not even scrub trees on the hills. The Columbia River Gorge was pretty though.....

Thursday, June 16, 2005


Thursdays route Posted by Hello

Thursday 6/15/05 – Dinosaur CO to Boise ID – 600 miles or so.

I guess I’m still on central time or something. My bladder woke me up at 5:30, so I got up, heated water for breakfast, and broke camp. The morning light made some of the rocks simply amazing. I poked around a bit, and found out that the dino dig site didn’t open until 9. Crap. Still, it’s not worth waiting another 2 hours, so I hit the road.

My route skipped Salt Lake City, so I took a side route through Logan, home of Utah State University. I guess I’m spoiled by Fayetteville, but Logan wasn’t terribly impressive. Fairly boring, in fact. Oh well – it’s not like it was a top contender for grad school.

The drive from Logan to Boise was fairly flat, especially considering the surroundings. I guess this is what they mean by the intermountain basin. It was also fairly hazy. I don’t know if it’s smog, humidity, or what, but the visibility was fairly poor. The pictures would have been crappy, so I didn’t take any.

I bailed on camping tonight. I called home and had Kevin find me a hotel in Boise. I was in the mood for a decent bed, shower, and an internet connection…..


View of the mountains behind me. Posted by Hello


Yours truly. Nice hair, eh? Posted by Hello


View of a lake west of the park Posted by Hello


Inside the park Posted by Hello


View from the campground Posted by Hello


Dino Nat'l Park scenery Posted by Hello

Wednesday, continued.

The trip from Steamboat to Dinosaur National Monument went well. I took a side trip through the Colorado portion of the park. It’s some really spectacular scenery. Pictures can only capture a small part.

I spent the night next to the Green River on the Utah side of the park. Lots of mosquitoes, but nice.

Wednesday, June 15, 2005


The view for my first part of the trip into the Rockies - nice, eh? Posted by Hello


Fort Collins to Dinosaur Nat'l Monument Posted by Hello

Wednesday 6/14/05 – Fort Collins CO to Dinosaur CO – 500 miles or so.

I left Chris and Mandy’s about 7:30 this morning. I headed west, and entered the mountains. Wow. A whole different scale. I was driving next to a river for the first couple hours. I can see why this is a kayakers paradise. I almost took a dirt road across the Buffalo Pass, but after remembering a warning that the pass was still closed, I turned around and took the long way…

I’m now in Steamboat Springs, having lunch, and getting on the internet. Sometimes technology is nice….


Here's the route from Hasty to Fort Collins Posted by Hello

Tuesday 6/13/05 – Hasty CO to Fort Collins CO – 300 miles or so.

I got a decent start on the day, and headed north. Again, I was keeping to the backroads as much as possible. For the most part, it was big empty spaces. The roads I was on had little traffic, and were bordered by ranches. Not many folks out there.

I tooked my time and looked around a bit, before making it to Fort Collins about 4:30. I spent the night with Chris and Mandy Parton, who I knew from Fayetteville. I worked with Chris at an engineering firm, before the office was down-sized and we were laid off. I had a great evening with them – we talked for a while, then had dinner together at a pub in the old town area of Fort Collins. It’s a thriving area, with tons of shops, bars, and eateries. There was even a band playing in the pedestrian mall. Nice.


My Campsite at John Martin Reservoir State Park in Colorado Posted by Hello


Here's the route from Fayetteville to Hasty Posted by Hello

Monday 6/12/05 – Fayetteville AR to Hasty CO. 600 miles or so.

I left Monday morning about 9:15. I was hoping to get an earlier start, but I wasn’t really pushing it. Getting packed at Mom’s, then picking up the trailer at Tim’s took a bit longer than planned. Still, it’s not like I have a tight schedule or anything.

My route was mostly smaller roads – Highway 412 through Tulsa, I35 up to Wichita, then state highways across southern Kansas and into Colorado. It went fairly easily, other that a good headwind most of the way. Between the trailer and the wind, I had a hard time keeping 75 mph without dropping out of overdrive. I’m sure I was getting awful gas mileage.

Despite the reputation, I found Southern Kansas to be fairly pretty. Perhaps it’s the time of year – things are still green – but it’s not as flat as southern Illinois. There’s gently rolling hills, and small old farming towns and grain elevators on a regular basis to break things up. You can, however, smell feedlots (industrial cattle holding pens) before you see them. Phew.

One of the most interesting things was the change in the towns immediately as I crossed into Colorado. The land and use didn’t change, but it seemed like people cared more about the towns in Colorado. Perhaps there’s more money, or a different tax structure, but while the towns were the same age, and all had fallen on hard times, the towns in Kansas had more junk & trash, the houses didn’t have the same care, and the lawns were in worse shape. Weird.

I stopped for dinner in Lamar, CO – seemed like a decent little town. I ate at a small Mexican diner, before driving the last 30 miles to the John Martin Reservoir State Park. I had the primitive camping area all to myself, looking out over the lake. Really nice. Jackrabbits everywhere, no real trees, and a view that went for miles. I head coyotes howling at night, freight trains in the distance, and slept well.

Monday, June 13, 2005

Well, I'm off.

After spending 2 weeks here with the family in Fayetteville, I'm leaving this morning for my trip west. I'm a little sunburned from Saturday's canoe trip down the Elk River in Noel, MO, but I guess I'll survive.

Today I'm headed to Colorado - I'm planning on spending the night camping at the John Martin Reservoir State Park in SE Colorado. It's about 600 miles I think. Tomorrow I'll drive from there to Fort Collins to spend the night with Chris & Mandy Parton. From there I'll head to Portland, stopping at Dinosaur Nat'l Monument on Wednesday, Bruneau Dunes State Park (Idaho) on Thursday, The Cove Palisades State Park (Oregon) on Friday, and a short drive into Portland on Saturday.

Of course, all this is subject to change. Who knows what I'll find along the way.

B