They told me after having surgery I shouldn’t do “anything athletic” for 1-2 weeks afterwards.  So, of course, three days later I went on a four mile hike.  Funnily enough, it wasn’t until halfway through the hike that I considered that it might be considered athetic.

Rick’s daughter Carrie visited us for the day, so we decided to go to Rattlesnake Ledge.  We thought it would be a nice short hike, since we didn’t get started until mid-afternoon.

The view from the bottom, and of Rattlesnake Lake.

The hike was steeper than we expected (I don’t know why, considering it did say the altitude change was over 1000 feet), but halfway up, it looked like it would be worth it.

The ascent took us just over an hour, and the view was definitely worth it.

Carrie enjoyed the view.

Of course, Tesla and Diablo got their reward as well.

A couple weeks ago, Rick came home and said, “Oh, we have something in this parade that’s happening in a few weeks.  They want volunteers, but I don’t think I want to do anything.”

“Ooooh, a parade?” I said.  I haven’t been in a parade since I was a teenager and in a marching band.  I love parades.  I love the bands, the floats, the drill teams.  It’s all just fun.  “What would we have to do?” 

Rick looked at me rather incredulously.  “I don’t know, but I’ll find out.”

It turned out they were looking for people to hold a giant balloon as well as people to just walk alongside the balloon and the bucket truck they were planning on having.  “Ooooh, that sounds like fun,” I said.  “As long as we don’t do the balloon.”

So, on Saturday we joined Rick’s coworkers for the entry in the Seattle Seafair Parade.  We parked downtown and then walked to the mustering point.  On the way, there was a commotion.  There was a boatload of pirates driving down the street, and they were all singing.

It was easy to tell the mustering point.  It’s where all the big balloons were.

We were close to the beginning of the parade, so I didn’t get to see many of the other entrants in the parades.  These are just of the people/entries before ours.

The Grand Marshal of the parade was some dude by the name of Sig Hansen (I think).  I didn’t recognize the name, but Rick said that it was someone who was on the show The Deadliest Catch.  What was ironic, I thought, was that there were more people clustered around Sig trying to get his picture than there were around the governor, who was standing about 20 feet away.

 Rick’s employer’s entry.  Or at least, some of it.

The governor.  She seemed very nice and approachable, though we didn’t approach her.

More entries.

After Ronald (and the chief of police), it was our turn.  It was then that we met up with the rest of the entry.

In what I think is the most inspired piece of public relations genius ever, there was a dance group (that first picture).  Not just any dance group – a dance group of high energy folks doing – you have to love this – the Electric Slide.  The bucket truck was playing the music, and the dancers performed all the way through.  They were fabulous, and were a big hit with the crowd.

That last picture is Ms Twisty, to encourage people to get compact fluorescent bulbs (which is what the balloon is, if you didn’t know).

It was now that I think Rick really appreciated why I didn’t want to be stuck holding down part of the balloon.  While the balloon handlers were busy maneuvering the balloon around wires and traffic lights and trees, Rick and I got to work the crowd, high-fiving the little kids, getting the crowd to clap in time to the music, and be general cheerleaders for the dance team.  We danced and clapped and high-fived our way all the way down Fourth Street.  It was great.  Rick said that lots of people were taking pictures of us.  The great thing about that was that I got to take pictures of some of them too.

This group looked like they had moved their entire apartment out on the sidewalk.  They had a carpet, refrigerator, light fixtures, and a full suite of furniture (which you can’t see for all the people).

More engaged crowds.  Rick and I both commented after the parade that we hate to do generalization, but based on the reactions we got from the crowds last night?  White people are BORING.  Whenever there were people of colour in the audience – whether they were black, Asian, Hispanic – they all got engaged with the dance group and the music.  White people?  Sat on their hands and looked at us.

Before long, we were close to the reviewers stand and the TV lights.  Attendance last night was estimated at 400,000.  The crowds you see in this picture were this dense for most of the parade route.

Everyone was having a good time.  Seattle’s finest were well and heavily represented downtown last night.

The TV stand.

The dance group performing for the cameras.

More views along the parade route.

Rick calls this place the “Rich White People” club.  They had a bordered off area for their members to watch the parade.  It was the only place along the parade where I saw people wearing suits.  You’ll notice that nobody looks like they’re actually smiling in this picture, even though they’re at a parade.

Fortunately, we went by people who knew how to have a good time shortly afterwards.

We had such a good time.  We both decided we’d do it again, but only if the dancers were participating – that made all the difference.  It was so much fun interacting with the crowd and the kids; we both had sticky hands by the end of the parade route. 

And we both got compliments, in our own way.  Rick got propositioned twice by women who wanted him to come closer and dance just for them, and I got told that I had “pretty good rhythm for a white girl” (I think that might qualify as a “damning with faint praise” type of compliment, but I’ll take it in any case).

Today was a perfect day for hiking, so we bundled the dogs in the car and headed for the mountains.  Of course, we had to stop for breakfast at our favourite place, the 12th Avenue diner.  It’s a family-owned type of diner that serves comfort food and of course, great breakfasts.  Their house special is the “Montana” which is potatoes, bacon, ham, green pepper, tomatoes and onion all sauteed together and topped with chesse, sour cream and green onion.  It’s wonderful.  I have mine without the onion and the sour cream on the side.  This was my breakfast this morning.  Keep in mind they offer the Montana in different sizes and this is the small:

After breakfast, we headed to Olallie State Park.  I’d wanted to go because I’d read there were a couple nice waterfalls there – Weeks Falls and Twin Falls.  Of course, the view from the parking lot alone was beautiful.

I don’t think this is a named falls, but it’s almost literally right next to the parking lot.  Tesla couldn’t wait to go have a drink.

Diablo quickly followed.

After about a mile and a half of hiking (during which I neglected to take any pictures, we came across Weeks Falls.  These pictures were taken from an 80 foot river spanning one of the forks of the Snoqualmie River.

Looking downstream from Weeks Falls.

Twin Falls.

The trail on the way back (I remember to take pictures this time).

After all that hiking, the boys were kind of hot, so we found a place just upstream where the boys could cool down a bit.  I’m betting Tesla thought that he’d discovered another branch of Lake Huron.  He didn’t hesitate getting in the water.

Diablo wasn’t quite as sure, especially when the water level went above his feet.

I think this is my favourite picture of the day.

It was a nice, fun little hike.  We could tell the path that we took was one of the less travelled – we had no problem finding parking, and the first quarter mile of the Twin Falls trail was almost overgrown – barely room for one person to make it through.  After that, though, it opened up and made for a very enjoyable hike.  We met a lot of people at the falls themselves; apparently there’s another trailhead a little further west that most people take.  We liked the less travelled route, mostly because we had the trail to ourselves.

So, last Friday, we were faced with dilemna (or I guess I was).  I could go to the last half day of the conference, or we could leave Portland early in the day and stop by Mount St. Helens on the way home.

Put that way, I don’t think there was much of a choice at all.

One of the things I learned was that Mt. St Helens is not a national park.  It’s called a National Volcanic Monument.  I’m not sure what the difference is, but all the signs made the point of saying that it was a National Monument.

Of course, you don’t have to be in the park before you get some pretty great views.

 

At one point you could see both Mt. St Helens and Mt. Adams.

And more views.

There are a few visitors centers along the way, including a Forest Learning Center.  The final visitor center is the official observatory.  In order to use the observatory or any of the trails, you had to pony up $8 each.  Being the hikers that we are, this was an easy decision, too, and received very stylish wristbands.

We then hiked along Eruption Trail.  As you can see, parts of it wasn’t quite ready for summer yet.

Nevertheless, the views along Eruption Trail were just as impressive as what we’d seen before.

There was also a memorial.

After hiking for a couple miles – and getting a lovely sunburn in the process – we left the park to continue on our way home.  Still the retreating views were picture worthy.

We arrived at the Portland City Center Marriott on Monday.  It was clear this was a slightly older hotel.

This is the lobby area.  It was a very nice hotel – there’s another Marriott downtown that Rick has stayed in, and he said this one was much nicer.  All the rooms had been upgraded, and in the grand scheme of things – a relatively small hotel.  Each floor had maybe 15 rooms.  I’d forgotten that I am a Gold Member in the Marriott Reward system, so we were provided access to the Concierge Lounge on the 20th floor (meaning we got breakfast and hors d’oeuvres every night.  We never made it up for hors d’oeuvres, but took advantage of breakfast every day).  Unfortunately, those kinds of perks will be going away as my travel time has decreased significantly over the past couple years.

After settling in the hotel, we went to the convention center to pick up my registration stuff.  No pictures of that, but I do have pictures of the conference center.

One of the nice things about Portland is that while the hotels were right downtown and the conference center was well over a mile away, they have a public transit system that is very efficient.  Best of all, to travel within the core downtown area is free.  The train stops were about a block and a half from the hotel and stopped right at the convention center.  You couldn’t ask for a better way to get around.

After exploring the convention center, we did a little walking around downtown.

For dinner that night, we went to Veritable Quandary.

Where we had wonderful food.

I think it was the first meal where I’ve voluntarily eaten whole roasted garlic cloves.  Fortunately, Rick still didn’t mind kissing me afterwards.  However, I forgot to take a picture of the most memorable part of the meal – dessert!!  Rick had been to the restaurant before, and had told me we absolutely, positively, had to have the chocolate souffle.  When they brought it out, it was twice the size of the serving dish, and then the server sliced the top and poured a verrrrrry rich chocolate sauce inside the souffle.  It was chocolate overload – so much so that we almost couldn’t eat it all (but we managed).  It was almost too rich, and I rarely say that (especially about dessert).

I took this next picture on one of the following days when we had some free time and were wandering around the city – it’s Skidmore Fountain.  It’s the one area of downtown Portland where the homeless population was more evident than others.  That’s the only negative thing I took away from Portland – the panhandling.  I don’t have issues with the homeless, particularly those who are trying to sell newspapers and the like.  But there was an amazing amount of panhandling.  In the block and half distance from the hotel to the train station, it was not unusual for Rick or I to be approached three or four times, in addition to the times on the train station on the way to/from the convention center.   But what really amazed me about the panhandlers in Portland was their age.  I doubt if any of them were over 25, or maybe 30 at the most.  I’ve walked around downtown Seattle, and the homeless population seems much older (I’ve also had fewer panhandling incidents).  It was startling to see the groups of young people literally drifting around the downtown area.

Of course, we had to go to the Portland book mecca.  Both Rick and I came away with just one book.

Another evening, we had the opportunity to meet Rick’s daughter and her boyfriend for dinner at this restaurant.  The food was excellent.  It had been billed as having the best calamari in Portland, and it was very good (we even coaxed Jenna into trying some for the first time).  Again, I remembered to take pictures of entrees but not of dessert (which this time was still-warm shortbread sandwiched around gelato and raspberry coulis).

All in all, a very good trip.  The restaurants in Portland are wonderful, and I hope we get to go back there soon to try out some more.