Seattle to Portland - The End

Unedited Vacation notes:

Thurs. 7/13 – flight outta OC to Seatac. Had dinner with Flor Davila; we stayed at her house the next couple of days. Very nice woman; writing feature on local Insane Clown Posse fans (jugallos and jugalletes). Husband Glenn, outta town, met him for a second a couple of days later.

Fri – getting our bike stuff together. Picked up bikes, I put them together, but needed an extra wrench for Barb’s pedals; went down to Bike Works down the street; this is a bike shop that takes stray crappy bikes, fixes them up, and gives them to neighborhood kids. Dinner with Nicole Brodeur at Barb’s favorite restaurant, Ristorante Machievelli.

Sat – K dropped me and Barb off at UW and we did our ride. Nice highlight around mile 80, nice bike path – tunnel of trees, lake on the right side, very pretty, mostly downhill. K went to Olympic National Forest. Met us at Centralia, we had food and drink at Mcmilian’s brew pub. Great. B said, “this is my first meal, another one later!”. Didn’t happen. Did some grocery shopping, stayed at hotel near Olympia. Sllloooooow reception guy. Bill Cosby in town, whoohoo.

Sun – started ride, sluggishly, thinking, oh shit, this aint’ gonna work, but after a few miles we got into it. Turned out to be great. Nicer scenery than Sat. Hotter. More hills. The sight of hundreds of bicyclists spread out along the road in the early morning sun. Riding over the Lewis and Clark bridge to Oregon (“Entering Oregon”!). Tired, sore butts. Across the finish line to cheering and happy crowds. A cold Fat Tire ale. Stayed at the Benson. Dinner at El Gaucho (Jeff Jolgen called it: El Gouge-O (high priced indeed)). I wore shorts and a tshirt, but hey, it’s Portland. Good steak though.

Mon – putzed around Portland; Powell’s bookstore; I hung out at Pioneer square reading Lee Child novel while B and K went to Nordstrom. Back to Seattle. Dinner with Jeff at Purple, a pretty nice wine bistro downtown. Good to see Jeff, in good spirits though a hint of sadness. Bought a new condo in Kirkland, not complete yet. Flor’s story in the Seattle Times today – really good.

Tues – K and I on our own, goofed off at Pike Market. I went to SF museum, had ticket to EMP, but spent too much time at Sf. Dinner was flavored cheese curds, bread, smoked salmon, beer. Yum.

Wed – Mt Rainier hike. Sunrise. Excellent. Fremont lookout. Kim did great. Mosquito bites, mostly K, poor thing. Dinner at Nicole’s with Barb and Taz (travel editor for ST). Barb, Taz, and Nicole – quite a group, very good friends, they appear to hang out quite a bit when together. Good people.

Thurs. – lazy morning. Breakfast at Pike Market. Putzed around, a couple of beers at a brew pub by UW while K and B shopped. Hung out at Lake washington for a spell, got a slice, then dropped B off at REI (she would get N’s car later), then K and I off to Seatac, then home. Kim and I both reading Lee Child (Jack Reacher is the protagonist) novels. Home to the kitties!
As for the STP, it was about what I expected, meaning it was a great time, we didn’t have trouble finishing the race due to our training, but our butts got sore. Oh well. Kudos to Kim my sweet for doing all she did…