Arrived in Portland and sort of felt at home right away, since we had been here in March and really loved it then. Checked in to the RV park, which is on an island (Jantzen Island) in the Columbia River, and got all set up. It is a very clean, nice big park which is completely full (what happened to folks going home after Labor Day? Apparently we will be competing with the entire elderly population from now on) but they had a space for us for just two nights. Then we'll find something else...

Our good friend Judy Culver invited us over to her beautiful, tiny Portland loft, for dinner and good conversation. Somehow, I knocked Mark's iced tea all over her floor and rug, and Katie rummaged through all of Judy's drawers, presenting personal items to be described. Judy was so kind about it, but she may have closed the door thankfully behind us. We're not Always like that, are we??

September 10

Went to the OMSI for the day and found a place for tomorrow night along the coast. Many places are all booked up, so we'll be at Bud's Campground and Grocery (sounds kinda suspicious--might be a pit).

The OMSI was really fun. We saw a planetarium show about Mars (very cool), toured an old diesel sub, spent a lot of time in the museum gift shop (Katie could have just spent the whole day there). Note: Mark spilt an entire chocolate milk at lunch. That's what Katie keeps mentioning about the day. Also saw an IMAX movie about Lewis & Clark (I loved it but Katie whined and then fell asleep on me), and then we wandered around the exhibits that were open (half were closed for repairs). My favorite exhibit was on the development of the (unborn) baby; it had real embryos and fetuses for every week of the 40 week cycle in a small, peaceful, circular room. They were all babies who had been "lost due to accident or nature" and preserved perfectly at their stage in development. It was absolutely mesmerizing to see the perfect details in a 9-week-old, every finger so so tiny. I kept wondering about the stories behind the babies. They all had their eyes closed, but they looked like they might still be alive, somehow. Some had uteruses around them, too.

We also did sciency stuff like testing our hearing (it's fine, for us all), and experiencing a tiny earthquake to Carly Simon's "I Feel the Earth Move Under My Feet," and finally pretending that we were weathermen.

After OMSI, we drove into central Portland and wandered through Powell's bookstore (an enormous place) and then ate dinner at the Whole Foods market across the street (what a gorgeous grocery store). Also I bought another little souvenier, a tiny spoon and a childlike bowl (what a sucker I am for unique tiny things).

We are now relaxing at "home" which feels as comfy as our home in Rocklin now. It is starting to pitter-patter a little rain outside, our first rain of the trip. I hope it really storms!

September 11

Woke up this morning to find that Katie had wet not only her bed but also our sheets. Also we had wetness from another leak: our front windsheild caulking is not complete, so we had a big puddle on our dashboard (good thing it didn't storm after all). Mark did a great job of fixing it (although tonight another section has appeared), but these little things keep happening. We're not writing about all of them, because they're little, but they start to add up: the molding around the bathroom door is falling off, two screws have fallen out of somewhere, and one of our window shades won't stay up anymore. I kinda wonder if every RV owner has these constantly or if we're still in our breaking-in period. Also the bedroom still won't extend open for us, not that we care anymore.

Here are pictures from our drive from Eugene to Portland, Oregon

The countryside we saw from the old Hwy 99.

I have an obvious fondness for old barns.

A little bridge that took us off Hwy 99 to a sweet little state park for lunch

Katie after our lunch.

more barns...

the dirt road that bested our RV (we unhitched the car and drove it instead)

even the road to the winery had old barns on it

Here are the pictures from Portland (September 9-11)

Portland's beautiful skyline (part of it), seen from the OMSI (the Oregon Museum of Science & Industry)

Katie and Mark outside the OMSI. This is the propellor for a 1959 sub (the last diesel sub) that we were about to tour.

Mark & Katie outside the old sub (decommissioned in 1990)

Katie at the helm

Kim watching the periscope

much of the sub looked like this--a mess of pipes and wires

woulda been okay for me, but not Shaq. Max height = 6 foot, 8 inches

here's where they cooked for everyone. Note the enormous mixer & whisk. The food was supposed to be very good, but everyone got sick anyway.

aren't these cool and old-timey? everything looked like this. Also there was fake wood panelling everywhere. Don't know why.

Here's Mark, preparing to give the weather report

Mark on tv

more of him

we all got in on it. Hola!

Portland - return trip
Columbia RV Park
September 19-21

"My favorite part at the zoo was seeing the giraffes." - Katie

September 19

We had to visit Portland again, so our friend Judy could see Martha (the RV). Also we just like any excuse to visit there. So we drove in and this time we stayed at Columbia RV Park, along the south shore of the Columbia River (no view though). It was given 5 stars by Woodall's (the very highest rating) so I expected something special. Now I think I understand how they rate parks. They think, "what does a retiree want?" This place was devoid of trees, flowers, anything with any kind of personality, but Boy was it clean. Not a cigarette butt or a pile of dog poop in site. Also no playground for Katie. But they had a laundry, which we needed.

Monday, September 20

The zoo is open and it is not raining, so we are going. It looked nice from the entrance when we visited back in April. It turned out to be one of the very best zoos I've ever been to, except for one tiny detail: they need a better map. Every few minutes we had to figure out where we were (we tried just wandering, but there are whole areas you miss that way). Then I started noticing other groups stopping and arguing about where they were, and i realized it wasn't us. It's a maze (albeit a beautiful one). So I took lots of pictures with long explanations to them (see below). I guess the place was built in the 1950s (the train was put in in 1958 I know), but the zoo looks completely new, with lots of elevation changes, fake rocks to give you that natural feeling, narrow windy paths taking you through woodsy areas to different animals... and lots of stuff for little kids like Katie to climb on and explore.

Also, we met a very nice little girl named Ally and her mommy (Sara) a couple times, and eventually Ally and Katie got to play together in a sandbox, and we got to chat with Sara, who has just moved to Portland three weeks ago from Oakland. Her husband is a software engineer and she is a psychiatrist, and they came up in April just like us, fell in love with the town and decided to move there. I told her that we practically did the same thing. The girls played really well together, and it was so nice chatting with her. We'll have to see how they continue to like living there.

After the zoo, we picked up Judy and brought her back to see Martha. She told us about her cruise to Alaska (she was one of the only passengers not getting seasick on the ride up due to 35-foot waves, so she had the boat largely to herself for awhile). It would be fun to see the icebergs ourselves someday, but you have to get on a boat to see a lot of that stuff. Martha can't take us everywhere.

Judy noticed right away the lack of cigarette butts at Columbia RV Park (she's a smoker), but she hoped that they allow folks to smoke outside the RVs (we were gonna fight anyone who tried to stop her).

Tuesday, September 21
Today we are leaving I-5 behind (yea) and hitting a smaller highway, Hwy 26, to head southeast to Bend. Mark's uncle used to live in Fossil, so Mark knows that area. We might get to see some fossils tomorrow.

Portland 2: the return trip

Here are pictures from our second pass through Portland. We visited the Oregon Zoo, which is a Great Zoo!

Katie and her new friend, Ally (age 2 but as tall as Katie). We met Ally and her mom Sara at the zoo. Ally lives in West Portland with her parents, who moved there only 3 weeks ago.

It was hard finding an animal that wasn't turning its back to us. This was maybe the best animal picture we got.

can you find the leopard?

This tiny diesel train has that great old 1950s look, because it was built in 1958. It's still running, and they said they have a miniature steam one too.

We took all the bat pictures for Mark's mom, Pat (she likes bats). The bat cave was my favorite room in the zoo. There were maybe 100 bats all doing something interesting, eating, "hugging," walking along the wire ceiling, etc.

This beetle was right Outside the plastic window for his exhibit (all his buddies and their banana were Inside). We told a passing zookeeper, who gathered him up, but who couldn't figure out how the little guy got out.

There was a new "farm" exhibit that included a petting zoo, farm equipment, and a mock barn and farmhouse.

the staw-bale maze in the farm exhibit

I love this old 1950s view camera. It's one of the only things that date this zoo to that era--the whole zoo feels very new.