today we took the beautiful drive from portland to hood river. what makes us such horrible photo-bloggers is that we get so caught up in what’s going on around us that we forget to take pictures. however, we did grab a few for some stories.
below is a picture of the bridal veil post office, much like a regular post office but 1/1000th the size. i guess a big point of interest for this particular site is that they hand cancel about 200,000 wedding invitations a year from lunatic brides that find it absolutely necessary to adorn their unusable stamp with “bridal veil.”
believe it or not there is no metal blue box outside. so, if you want something sent, you have to hand it off to a real live person! how archaic right? in any case, that person might happen to be lovely woman named geri and she might happen to have an adorable helper named buster. geri very specifically wanted us to mention that they stay in business when people, like you, buy stamps. so if you live in the portland / hood river area, do your part to encourage bridal disorders for years to come.
geri wasn’t a big fan of me stealing pictures of her, but buster didn’t seem to mind. geri said that if she could have any attribute or quality, it would be “organization.” buster seemed pretty ambivalent.
here’s us myspace-ing it up by the multnomah falls ( yah - haven’t quite mastered the art yet ).
dodge caravan vs the bridge of the gods.
in exploring a little town, we found a dock that extended about 150 ft onto hood river. two steps into our walk, we got hit with a wind that literally took us against the railing. getting out of the car, the temperature was 25 degrees. add the furious winds of the gods ( who’s bridge had just been schooled by a mini-van ) and it was pretty darn cold. in any case, i really wanted to make it to the end of this dock. i kept pushing forward till i heard “MICHAEL!!!! I CAN’T…( MUFFLED NOISES).” i turn back to see nellie -
we helped each other to the end and it was really spectacular. of course, we didn’t stay there long. here’s us running to safety.
one thing that we’ve found in a lot of northwest cities ( that you wouldn’t ever find in california ) is the joining of a movie theatre and restaurant. for me, that’s paramount to the combination of slapping a pint of ice-cream between two high-calorie cookies. of course andrews pizza + skylight theatres takes this a step further by offering selections from four breweries, local to hood river. a local brew, fresh pizza, and a movie? i should have brought my PJs.
for those of you wondering what we saw… we watched JUNO which was the perfect movie ( IMO ).
well, that’s all for now. it’s back to work tomorrow!
Monthly Archive for January, 2008
WARNING : boring ( yet informative ) post.
welcome to portland
i realize that this is quickly becoming a travelers cuisine blog and i’m ok with that. we like food, you like food, most of our budget is being blown on food… it’s very american and i’m sure that we have an understanding. that said, we found of the most bitchinist deli in the known earth. i’m a big fan of the rueben. i think that mr. rueben was very bold to take 4 ingredients, that most people have distinct feelings towards, and blend them all together. but kenny & zukes didn’t just make a rueben. no, this was something much more! i looked on as the sandwich maker, nay CHEF, draped ( configured rather ) cuts of piping hot pastrami over a bed of melted swiss and cool sauerkraut. unbelievable!
after lunch we stopped in at a coffee shop where we continued to discover that oregon boasts of some of the most delightful people on earth. jeana couldn’t help but notice that we were from out of town ( i think because we were the only peeople wearing sweaters in the whole of the northwest ). she was so kind and helpful in making sure that we got a chance to see the “real” of portland culture. she is studying to be a lawyer and if she could have any quality or attribute, it would be the sudden and supernatural knowledge of all things “the bar.” here’s a picture of jeana staring down a rooster. we’re prayin’ for your success. thanks for all the help!
traveling on a budget brings some pretty exciting adventures. one of which is sharing a single bathroom with about 50 strangers. we’ve thoroughly enjoyed sleeping on the road, but it seems distinctly “less safe” in the city. we had two hotels that i needed to take pictures of ( for the job ), so we were set on those nights, but had a night in the middle that we were leaving up to chance. glad we did because we happened across one of the SCHWEETEST places that we’ve ever stayed. it’s called the ace hotel and it’s just east of portland’s pearl district. we stumbled across it after seeing the totally retro “photobooth” in the window. it had the most thorough branding that i have seen in a hotel and the bathroom thing didn’t turn out to be so bad. here’s a glut of pictures, all lit by the two provided “clamp lamps.”
check out this flat screen!
we went out for good old fashioned “pho” restaurant with the beautiful and talented michelle knopp. joining the knopp family for coffee and brownies, we talked politics, being a professional musician in portland, and how i’m really slackin’ on building a respectable harem ;) here’s a pic of the girls myspace stalking
we’re LOVING portland! more to come
today we crossed over our first state line! the “touring” phase of our trip has officially begun and we can’t wait to see what’s in store!
we’ve been pretty impressed so far. oregon is a beautiful state with so many diverse landscapes and personalities. here’s some pics from the road, starting with a beautiful shot of mt. shasta that nellie grabbed ( she’s also responsible for that awesome shot of the GPS on the golden gate bridge. )
a couple shots i snagged while nellie was picking out a cobbler. black bear diner strikes again!
funny story. i didn’t realize that oregon is a “full service” state. so, we pull up to love’s, i located my wallet, turn to open the door, and WAH-BAMM! a women, who looked like she just climbed off the swiss alps, has her nose pressed against my window, her flaring nostrils melting off ice flakes that had accumulated from the drive. after placing our order nellie and i frantically started trying to figure out what was the next acceptable move.
“so, do we tip her or what?!”
“i think so. how much to you have?”
“NOTHING, NOTHING! i’d have to go into make change and i don’t know if that will just escalate things!!”
“you’ve got to give her something!”
“this is crazy. i’m perfectly capable of pumping my own stinking gas! people in california do it all the time without melting down their local stations!”
as she returned, i made the decision to take the cute, naive approach and just ask. “soooo, can i ask you a question?”, “YEAH” she muttered in the most american accent she could muster. i collected my self and sheepishly added “are we supposed to give you a little, you know… somethin’ something?”, as i suggestively twisted a tattered 20 between my fingers. “WHAT?!” she fired back, her germanic glottal stop a little more prevalent. her nostrils started to flare up again and i realized, at that moment, that i’d made a huge mistake for stopping there. i mean, the money that we had saved by carefully rate shopping would now be absorbed with this crazy oregon mandatory gratuity situation. i threw the money out the window and spun off furiously. i managed to snap this picture off as the horrifying transformation unfolded.
fleeing for your lives builds up an appetite and nothing feeds hunger like battered clumps of deep fried wisconsin cheese! it was there that we met jamie. after talking a bit about our trip ( in the drive-thru ) jamie encouraged us to come inside and get a solid plan for how were going to see oregon. here’s a shot of him through the window.
we’ve been asking people that we meet this question. “if you could wake up tomorrow with any ability or quality, what would it be?” jamie said that he would want the ability to “bless people’s day with Jesus.” thanks for all your help jamie and really blessing us on the first stages of our trip.
nellie and charity go way back. and when i say way back, i think that they were sojourning camels in a previous life together. visiting her was just about the only way that we were going to cut out 3 days of an otherwise metropolitan tour to visit redding, ca. haven’t heard of it? just google “red robin.” i’m pretty sure that redding boasts of the last freestanding one in america.
despite a lack of “things to do” we had an incredible time and were really sad to leave.
i have a moj-poj of pictures. so, i’ll give you the 2-peso version. here’s one of my lovely wife as we’re leaving the FoodMaxx! ( yes, two x’s and an exclamation point )
ok, one thing that i didn’t mention is that redding is home to the most incredible church that i have ever visited. bethel is a model of what church should be. free, accepting, christ-focused, challenging, and relevant. we were blown away by the spirit and foundation that is present there. we were blessed to be part of it for even a day. if you’d like to hear some of the powerful teaching, you download the podcast from there site ibethel.org.
after church we went the “black bear diner” to find the saddest wooden bear alive.
oh yah! it snowed!
yaks koffee cool place.
my hair has looked this awesome, pretty much the entire trip.
charity’s not a fan of having really unflattering pictures taken of her and posted on the web. here’s two.
we miss you char. see you in san francisco!
we love cheese. so, when the sanoma cheese factory showed up on the garmin we jumped on it.
25 cubs, and a bottle of tumbs later, we discovered a buttered cinnamon-raisin bread that was soo good that we literally experience a momentary loss of taste, as our mouths stood bewildered by the toasty-buttery goodness!
after hours on the road, nellie had a hard time feeling comfortable. somehow, this seemed to help…
we skipped dinner and caught a late showing of “27 dresses” ( cute ). tomorrow, charity and the revival church!
our three days with mr. dillon have been unbelievable!
a big part of this trip surrounded our desire to meet with mr. dillon. after meeting he and his wife last year, we had the sense that they were people that we could be transparent and honest with. the two of them have an incredible ministry in santa rosa, deepening marriages through healing hearts. that’s a mouthful, yes, and a pretty loaded statement. however, nellie and i have been changed in a deep and profound way this week. i’m sure that you will get glimpses of it in the posts to follow, but we have discovered a piece and excitement in Christ that we haven’t yet known.
there’s way to much to speak of here, but drop us a line if you’d like to learn more about the amazing work that God is during through them.
of course, a quick shot of the man, the myth, the legend… mr. dillon. thank you so much for opening your home and hearts to us. we have been deeply blessed by you.
in the midst of the move, some last minute weddings, and a little bit of work, nellie and i decided that we would push on through the first leg of our trip. so, we’ve had very little time for that “road trip” pace, where you use more gas restarting the car than running it. so, here’s a picture of about all we’ve seen of san fransisco. we promise that there will be more to come.
also, an impromptu portrait session, inspired by some cool fluorescents.
ps. our meeting with mr. dillon is well under way and we can’t wait to tell you how it’s going!
this is what we looked like this morning.
yah, pretty fabulous. hold on while we brush our teeth next to the VONS employee time card machine…
we woke up early and managed to have breakfast at one of my absolute favorite breakfast joints on the coast tupelo junction cafe. i had a bacon, spinich, pepper, and gouda omlette, while nellie attacked her poached eggs and guacamole topped crab crab cakes, covering a bed of house potatoes, drizzled with a lemon butter sauce. A-MA-ZING!!! in any case, they get a 5 star rating from us. you won’t be disappointed.
oh yah, and the best orange juice known to man!
by the way, a lot of people asked how i scored a uber-talented babe like nellie. i think that this picture says enough.
well fed and lookin’ fly, we’re off to smack the 101’s teeth in!
nellie and i had pretty lofty plans for the first leg of our trip. we had 2 days to drive from vista to santa rosa ( an hour past san francisco ). in an effort to fill our vast multitude of time, we figured we’d make a stop in santa barbara, enjoy a great sunset, take in a movie, and eat ourselves silly. of course, i still had a number of loose ends to tie up and an 11am departure turned in to 2pm, which turned quite quickly into 5, 7, and finally 9… :16 that is. ten hours behind schedule gets an airline sued and i discovered it to warrant a pretty fat starbucks settlement in the chan home. strike 1. regardless, we were ten hours behind and it wasn’t 45 minutes before the narcoleptic in me started utilizing more than my allotment of 1 lane of traffic. strike 2. so, we landed in LA. nellie dragged my drooling, limp carcass into our back seat bed and called it a night. ideal? not really but it’s like grandpa used to say: “if you can’t catch a movie in santa barbera, might as well catch some Zs on the 405.”
before we get moving too quickly, and the road ahead washes over thoughts of this past week, we must say this: your excitement and support has blown us away and spoken volumes to our hearts. moms, dads, brothers - you guys really pulled it out in fitting our 5 bedroom house into 2/3s of an upstairs, medium sized, storage unit. your unbelievably generous gifts and encouragement wasn’t waisted on us. to our friends - thanks for taking us out to so many dinners and lunches, filling our thoughts with so many great memories of home and our wallets with enough gift cards to support nellie’s starbucks habit ( a gift to us both, i assure you ). your excitement over us is inspiring and humbling. we have so much confidence in this trip and that Lord has set in our hearts to do. your support has shown us that you believe it as well. thank you.
now. let the journalling begin!