Victoria, BC

Victoria was our last stop on our cruise. : ( When we were on the ship at Glacier Bay, we did a Murder Mystery dinner with A&J and met another couple who was from Victoria. They're familiar with Portland, so they said that even though Victoria is cute and great for wandering around that we could do that in Portland and that we should see The Butchart Gardens. So, we did and stayed for their fireworks display. While the gardens were completely amazing, I think we made the wrong choice. We knew we would be arriving in the late afternoon and that the sun would go down, but we underestimated how quickly that would happen. We didn't get to see all of the gardens, so it was kind of a bummer. What we did see, though, was amazing. And not getting to really see Victoria just means Jeff and I can go up there for a long weekend sometime. : )

The Sunken Garden - it was a limestone quarry on the Butchart's property. Mrs. Butchart didn't care for the eyesore once the quarry had been exhausted, so she prettied it up.

We were given a plant and flower guide, so hopefully I'm identifying these flowers right. If you know I'm wrong about something, let me know and I'll change the captions. : )

Dahlia

A big bunch of flowers that I'm not going to try and identify. I just loved the colors.

Ageratum, Floss Flower

Pretty Landscaping

I don't know what these are, and I'm sad, but my best guess is some sort of zinnia. They were my favorite flowers of the day because they were so cheerful and brightly colored.

Fuchsia

More pretty landscaping.

Agapanthus, Lily of the Nile

Me! On an orca on the Rose Carousel.

Jeff and I on the Rose Carousel.

Jeff rode on Bella, the Butchart's dog. At least that's the story from the kind lady who took our picture. : )

Dahlia

These could be one of several; I can't tell for sure. :-P

Arum, Lords and Ladies

These were in the Japanese Garden, but I'm not sure what they are.

Gladiolus, Acidanthera

Heliotropium, Heliotrope or Cherry Pie plant

Fireworks!

After Victoria, our ship headed back to Seattle. We arrived early the next morning, and decided to hit up SweetIron again on our way out of town for some waffles. Since we started the cruise there with such amazing food (the cruise food couldn't even compare), we decided to end our cruise with such amazing food. : )

Tulips and Tomaters!

Jeff and I went to the Tulip Festival today to play with our new Nikon D40. We love it (FYI not so impressed with Abe's of Maine even though we got a decent deal; it took about 3 weeks to get our camera and their customer service kind of stinks).

After the tulip festival, we went and checked out the Flying Pie Pizzeria because it's supposed to be Chicago Style pizza. Our friend D took us to the Art of Pizza when we were in Chicago once and it was absolutely a-m-a-z-i-n-g pizza. This place was pretty good, but definitely not Chicago style. We'll try it again with their Sicilian (extra thick crust) to see if that is like Chicago style. Otherwise we'll move on and try someplace else!

Then we went to Al's Garden Center and picked up a tomato plant so I can have homegrown tomatoes this summer. Her name is Rosie. She's a Jet Star tomato plant, and Rosie is the name of the robot on the Jetsons (JET star JETsons) so we went with it.

Anyway, tulips!



Can't you imagine this cute little guy putting along on his tractor in a field of tulips? He wasn't, actually. He was just sitting on a tractor while his wife took his picture.


This is me, excitedly racing my duck.

This is me, when my duck wiped out.

This kid had a spectacular lineup of ducks that wiped out. Do you see the one who is totally posing for the camera?

This is my Summit.

She's sort of an attention whore. I was making reservations for a scotch tasting next week at a local brew pub (I don't try to spell or pronounce its name because things get tied in knots). She decided that it would be cool to wander up onto my back in s-l-o-w motion (because I won't notice her doing something she knows she shouldn't do if she does it sloooooowly, you know).

But she gives me Eskimo kisses, so I don't mind too much.

4 places we need to try eating at . . .

Voodoo Doughnuts. They doughnuts and sweets; some of them are vegan. Interesting, right? The Amazing Lady who came to Portland got to try some of their stuff at her conference (it was all vegan food because it was about animal rights) and said it was surprisingly good. They also have doughnuts that are chocolate with chocolate frosting and cocoa puffs on top. Need I say more?

Papa Haydn. One of the Amazing Ladies who lives here says they have amazing desserts. And man their menus look good!

Moonstruck Chocolates. They have turkey shaped truffles right now! That right there has me sold. I mean how stinkin' cute are they?! I'd buy them just to look at them and giggle all year round.

Huber's: Portland's Oldest Restaurant. They have turkey. And turkey legs. And I have a thing for turkey. Near as I can tell it's one of the best reason to go to a state fair. Well, that and funnel cakes. And elephant ears. And corn on the cob. And other fair food. But turkey legs are highest on that list.

And I would walk 5xx miles . . .

I've always liked I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles) by The Proclaimers. I think it has something to do with the accent. Anyway, even though I think I walked 500 miles today and I would not walk 500 more I would consider hiking the 5.2 miles Jeff and I hiked today some other time.

We decided to go see Multnomah Falls today since it appears that for the foreseeable future we're going to have a good chance of rain every day. I think this means it's winter in Oregon. Or the rainy season. *sigh* :( I'm not very excited about that since near as I can tell the only good thing about a rainy day is taking a nap. And while I'm a huge fan of naps I don't think I need one every single day from October until whenever spring and sunshine come back to Oregon.

Anyway, back to Multnomah. It was a fun day. We saw lots of nifty things. We started at the Return Trail and hiked our way to Wahkeena Falls. On our way, we saw:

These adorable little purple flowers.


This really neat wall of moss that has water trickling down it. Even though it was gray and overcast the wall just sparkled in the light. Next time we go back, we're going to have a new pretty camera that takes better pictures so you can see it. As it is, pretend it's a wall that looks like Edward (or any of his family members) in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series.


Smurf houses! I assume next time we go back I'll actually be able to see the Smurfs in the houses with the new SLR camera we decide on.


And then we saw the Wahkeena Falls.


Then we hiked some more. And saw the Fairy Falls. Can you believe there's not a Wikipedia article about them? They were my favorite falls! And our camera seems to be on it's deathbed and is convinced that all batteries are dead, even if they're brand new so we didn't get a picture of them. Shortly after the Wahkeena Falls our camera died. That left us with pictures taken on our Blackberries. We figured they'd be scary, so we didn't take too many with them. And unfortunately they're not worth posting. :(

Next time I'll listen to Jeff when he suggests being conservative about taking pictures because we still have over 4 miles remaining on our 5.2 mile hike.

The rest of the hike was beautiful. The Wahkeena Springs were fairly unexciting. I was expecting water bubbling up from underground and it was just running out of the ground. There's no Wiki article about those, either. So I'll leave the googling of pictures up to you. On our downhill walk, we saw Ecola Falls which were neat and Weisendanger Falls. And seriously, what is up with Wikipedia?! You'll have to google them yourself, too. They were both gorgeous waterfalls.

At the bottom we finally saw Multnomah Falls, which were kind of the least exciting in my mind. They're very tall. And they're hard to photograph because they're so tall. They have a bridge that goes over the break between the upper and lower falls that is really cool. And at the bottom they have this fantastic little lodge (we're ignoring that I'm slightly miffed that it can be called a lodge but doesn't have rooms to stay overnight in) that has the most amazing smoked salmon fetuccini I have ever had in my life (well, technically it's tied with the crab fetuccini I had in Rapid City, SD when we were driving through there on vacation a million years ago).

Everybody needs to come visit us. My Uncle J did! He stopped by last night and took Jeff and I out for dinner. It was awesome to see him and we had a really good time. Summit performed her tricks and galloped like a horse through the living room. Food was excellent. Stories were amusing. There's plenty of Oregon to share!

Mount Hood Revisited

So Jeff and I decided when we were at Mt. Hood with the Amazing Lady the week before last that we needed to go back and hike on some of the trails. Today was perfect weather for it, so we did.

We tried to hike the Zig Zag Canyon Overlook trail, but it seemed to be MIA. Either that or we just couldn't find the darn thing. And after hiking up a really, really big hill (otherwise known as the side of Mt. Hood) I wasn't willing to walk back up that really, really big hill (aka the side of Mt. Hood). Especially since it was pretty warm out. We did get a couple pictures of Mt. Hood above the treeline which was cool. And we also saw snow which made me happy (it was closer than on Mt. Hood, we had to step over a patch).


Here's a view from above the Timberline Lodge. The mountain that you can faintly see is Mount Jefferson. No, it's not named after Jeff even though people call him Jefferson. But we like to pretend that it is.


We drove back down and did the Mirror Lake Hike which was very pretty. It was a much cooler hike and had some beautiful foliage. Mirror Lake isn't nearly as cool as Trillium Lake for reflecting Mt. Hood purposes, but it was pretty good. Here's me on the way with some pretty trees.


Here's Jeff at Mirror Lake with Mount Hood reflecting nicely in the water.

And here's a craggly cliffy thing that looks way cooler reflecting than any of the pictures we got of Mt. Hood reflecting. Really, Trillium Lake seems to be the best for that.

On our way home we found a BBQ place and man did that hit the spot. It's been a long while since we've had real BBQ. It just didn't seem to exist in Boston. The last good BBQ we had was in Ames at Bufford's. And before that it would have been in Ames at Hickory Park. Oh how I love Hickory Park. Their BBQ is great and their dessert menu? Well let's just say that it's an entire placemat. And it's aaaaallllll ice cream. How can you go wrong with that?

So what'd *you* do today?

Because I bet it wasn't nearly as cool as what I got to do today! :) Let me tell you about it as I unwind with a glass of white wine.

This morning Jeff and I headed into Portland to pick up the Amazing Lady from her conference. We decided to get lunch, and her hotel (the Ace Hotel which gets rave reviews from her, by the way)was in the Pearl District which has amazing food everywhere you go. Since it was near her hotel we settled on Kenny & Zuke's. The Amazing Lady had latkes that looked amazing. Jeff had a burger and I had a pastrami and egg salad sandwich which was incredible.

Then, we headed out of Portland to see Mt. Hood. We had high hopes of getting to watch salmon swim up river, but it was not something we saw. Doesn't that sound like a fun thing to do? Isn't the description of the dam and the viewing windows interesting? I don't know if we were in the wrong spot, but we saw a big area with some sturgeon in it. Which was neat, because they were huge. And we saw salmon. But they weren't swimming in the river, they were in tanks. And the tanks were crowded. And the tanks at the bottom? Yeah, they had nice concrete and wooden doors that they kept jumping into and slamming their heads on, in addition to a metal ladder that clanged loudly when they hit their lil' heads. :( It was not the highlight of the day.

While we were there, though, we got to see part of the Oregon Trail. Jeff died of dysentery, which is why he isn't in the picture with the Amazing Lady and me (he has a shirt that proves it!). And though I don't look sad about it please realize that Jeff dying of dysentery would break my heart. So we kept driving along, and eventually we saw this: Mount Hood in the distance! And yes, we made Jeff pull over so we could get our first mountain picture of the day. But wait! It gets better! A little bit down the road, we saw the sign for Trillium Lake which seemed like it would be promising. So after bumping along on a scary road that gave me a quick panic attack we found Trillium Lake. And it was so much better than we thought it would be. I mean look! It's just like the Wikipedia picture! Isn't it the prettiest natural thing you've ever seen (please note that I'm ignoring the fact that the Wikipedia article just pointed out that the lake was man made in the 60s - I prefer to think that it's a natural reflecting-the-mountain-pool rather than a man made one). And hey, check this out! Maybe Jeff didn't die from dysentery after all! I think that's excellent news, don't you? After that, we headed back to town. We made good time driving through the mountains, so we were back in Portland earlier than expected. So we detoured home, went out to eat, and then dropped the Amazing Lady off at the airport.

And now I'm unwinding with a glass of wine (that is not very good, unfortunately). And I need to feed the monstas. And pass out. Because I'm exhausted from my awesome day!

Wa, Kei, Sei, Jyaku

So Jeff and I have had a busy couple of days. :)

Tuesday we went to the zoo. They're trying to pass a bond to do some updates on it, and it does need it. Some of the exhibits are 50 years old or more and could use some work. The sea lions were awesome. They'd swim right by and stare at you. And the sea otters were adorable. The highlight of the day was their baby elephant named Samudra that's about 2 months old. He is the cutest, funniest little guy. We also saw some baby Warthogs and a couple of fat Meercats.



See? A little tubby. Totally not like the ones on Animal Planet's Meerkat Manor. Oh! And there's a fudge shop in the gift shop. And it is fabulous fudge.

On Thursday one of the Amazing Ladies flew in for an animal law conference here in Portland. I convinced Jeff that it would be cool for her to stay with us so I could finally meet an Amazing Lady in real life. And let me tell you she is not only amazing but super awesome.

We went to McMeniman's to eat and it was goooood stuff! They have beer that they brew on site that was amazingly good. I had one called Ruby which is raspberry beer and it was delicious! The food was good and there were so many things on the menu I wanted to try that we're going to be visiting there a lot.

Friday morning we dropped the Amazing Lady off in Portland for her conference and ran some errands. And then we went to the Smart Car dealership to look at Smart cars. I am soooo dying to have one. They're so cute! And if I'm the only person driving or it's just Jeff and I it seems like such a waste to be using a full sized car to drive around. Most of the time it will be just Jeff and I. So I'm working really hard on convincing Jeff we both need one. They can park in the same parking spot together and keep each other company! And I'll feel less wasteful. If we have people come to visit we can rent a car for the weekend down the street. Or heck, even at the airport if they fly in. So far no luck on that. But he hasn't come up with an option that I'm happy with, either, so we'll keep working on it!

Today Jeff and I went to the Saturday Farmer's Market so he could see one. It wasn't as good as the one close to our house, but it still had a lot of my favorite vendors to show him. The Cactus Lady was there. And of course the German Sausage guy was there. Plus a guy who has never been at our market - a BBQ guy! So we had a BBQ sandwich for brunch.

Then we went to the Japanese Gardens which were amazing. They had several different types of gardens and they were all so quiet and relaxing. The leaves on lots of the trees were changing, and the maples were especially pretty. We saw a tea ceremony which was neat, but would probably make me impatient to wait for my cup of tea. :) The principles of a tea ceremony are Harmony, Respect, Purity & Tranquility. The title of the post is Japanese for each of those words.

There are these bushes all around Portland (and especially around one of the Intel Campuses) that are just amazing right now. I think they're my favorite fall color this year. Here's a few more pictures of the Japanese Garden.