Oregon

After eight days in Montana, I flew over to Portland to visit a friend. Originally I was going to visit a friend from college who's been inviting me to visit for at least the past five years. So I finally decided to go, bought a ticket, we were all excited, and.....his work sent him to China for a business trip on the days I was scheduled to be there. Yeah, bummer. But I had another friend I had been planning on hanging out with for one day of my time there, and so plans shifted, he took time off from work, and planned a really great weekend of exploring Oregon. Oregon is a wonderfully beautiful state, and in spite of the not so fantastic weather(it rains a lot there), I had a really good weekend. We spent a day wandering up and down the Oregon Coast; stopping at beaches, looking in little shops, trying seafood, getting soaked, went on a tour of the Tillamook Cheese Factory, etc. The next day we, along with his roommate, went to one of Oregon's many state parks/nature reserves and went on a 6 mile hike and saw several lovely waterfalls. The weather was a little nicer that day, with no rain, and I really loved the hike...and the fact that I was actually in really great shape for it! On the way back, we stopped at a fish hatchery and checked out some enormous 7 ft. Sturgeon. That evening we wandered around one of Portland's multiple artsy little neighborhoods, went to a Salon opening party for a friend of his, and watched the sun set at a scenic overlook. We did a few more spontaneous things that kept me on my toes(he's more spontaneous than I am, I guess), and it was a really fun, if busy, weekend. Monday I went to Seattle, but I'll save that for the next post.....

With Joseph at Cape Meares Beach

I could have sat in the ocean all day looking at these spectacular creatures. And yes, these are their real colors, un-edited.

Oceanside Beach. At lunch, we saw a door in the side of a cliff, went to see what it was, found a tunnel, went through, and discovered another beautiful part of the beach. I love exploring!

Multnomah Falls

One of the fun neighborhoods in Portland. I had some ice-cream at a place called Salt & Straw that blew my mind: Strawberry balsamic vinagrette with cracked pepper, and pear and blue cheese. All of the other flavors were incredible, as well(we sampled several). We need a place like that in CLT!