Party time in Portland
After a short layover in Seattle – where it was also snowing and man these were HUGE snowflakes coming down – Pam and i were on our way to Portland, home to the wonderful Bootsnall, beer and micro breweries and the biggest bookstore ever!!
Just after 6pm we pulled into the station and it was raining heavily – welcome to the Pacific Northwest – where it rains more than in England!! Jumped into a cab and headed to the HI hostel to meet up with the rest of the Boots members and get ready to party. I have been wanting to come to the annual xmas party here in Portland ever since i joined boots over two years ago. Thankfully the awesome London Xmas Parties helped somewhat in the waiting part.
The staff at the hostel had given us Booties the rooms downstairs and our own common room which was sweet. I have to admit i was a little nervous at the prospect of meeting a truckload of new people all in one evening – especially people that i kind of knew. As it was i neednt have worried – everyone i met was super awesome and i had a great time. After the party we went to the Silver Dollar bar where i could indulge in a jack and coke – and American freepour measures – woot!!
Slightly hungover on sunday morning the guys that hadnt taken insanely early flights met up with the local Portlanders and we headed out to breakfast. The afternoon and evening were spent chilling out recovering. Monday morning and its still raining – in fact it hasnt stopped since i got here. We braved the rain to head out to Powells – the infamous bookstore that takes up a whole block and has several levels. I could seriously live in here – in fact we wandered around perusing books. They also sell second hand book from $2 which is a bargain especially couples with the fact that Oregon does not have sales tax. Needless to say i bought a few to keep me happy for a while. Not really in the mood to do more sightseeing as its impossible in this weather so again we chilled out at the hostel. Monday evening the few of us that were left (Bill, Bill, Madhu and me) met up with Julie and Jillian and went out for something to eat and have a couple of drinks at Jillians bar. You can still smoke in the bars in Portland which is weird to see – i have to say i now im used to being outside i dont like it in a bar anymore which i NEVER thought i would say.
Madhu left on tuesday morning and we met up with Jessie for breakfast before she left. Jessie and I went to the Boots HQ which is a lovely house in the suburbs – oops secrets out now. I had the tour and chatted with the guys before leaving them to their very busy work in the bootsnall world!! Guys – thanks for showing me around and sparing the time to chat to me – it was awesome. In the afternoon i headed down to Pioneer Square and its not raining woo hoo so managed to get in some walking around.
Wedsnesday evening i met up with Roger and Tiff and went to the M bar – which is the tiniest bar i have ever seen. We had a few beers and chatted about travel and i managed to shock Roger by telling him that i dont intend to ‘see’ LA when im there. I plan to stay at the hotel and chill out before my flight to NZ and take full advantage of a fancy hotel’s facilities.
I had a slight panic attack on thursday when realised that beacuse of flooding and storms in the area – the trains and roads were closed (parts of the I5 were under 10foot of water.) Managed to get a ticket for saturday afternoon and changed my reservations at both hostel here and in Seattle. Kind of glad i ended up booking a flight from Seattle to Chicago as it gave me two extra days to play with.
I spent my last two days chilling out – went shopping with Tiff to buy some much needed trousers and managed to be good and not buy anything else – man that was a killer – there are some great shops here. I also went to see a movie and saw Enchanted – which is a disney movie about a fairytale princess getting dropped into New York City by the wicked step mother. Its a cheesy movie but actually a pretty good one.
And that rather boringly was the end of my trip to Portland and off to Seattle i go.
Tags: USA
Administrator
Leave a Reply