January 19, 2007

• Pacific Northwest (Portland, Seattle & Vancouver)

  Portland, Oregon

  
  Portland Rose Garden (except no roses during this time of the year )

  

  
  Multnomah Falls

  Seattle, Washington

  

  
  Pike’s Open Market

   

  
  Space Tower

   

  

  
  My newest model for my camera!

  

  
  Wall Of Art

  
  Our very enthusiastic Underground Tour Guide

  

  
  

  Vancouver, Canada

  

  

  

  

  
  Alfred Hitchcock Resurrected 2007

  

  

  Finally a fresh post on to my xanga.  I apologize for being MIA for a while again.  After the holidays I had my hands pretty full with work, following up on job applications and then my very fun and adventurous trip to the Northwest coast (Portland, Seattle and Vancouver).  I apologize for not visiting those who live in those region but I was on a time limited schedule through each place I visited so I didn’t have time to squeeze you in !  Sorry for flooding this post with pix.  I was a picture whore on this trip! =) If you notice I like photos that either look badly cropped or to the side, I tend to dislike photos that are dead center! =)

  As much of the United States has been experiences the unusual cold weather especially the midwest and most especially California.  The cold has definitely caused some damage as many of you might be aware of to our agriculture industries especially for citrus fruits.  I would really hate to see the prices go up for OJ and Oranges in general but that will most likely be the case.  Places like Sacramento have hit record lows in the low 20′s and while it was cold back where I live I didn’t manage to escape the cold at all.  In fact, it was freezing throughout the whole trip up the Northwest (typically excepted but colder than usual this year they say).  I don’t think I’ve been colder in my whole life but whatever you get used to it once you face, ears, hands and feet go numb, haha!  Even though it was terribly cold I was still able to get a lot of photos in throughout the course of my trip which I was very excited about doing in the first places.  Unfortunately I wasn’t able to capture the many gardens available in Portland and especially in Canada since most of them were snowed over or pretty much dead during this time of the year.  Never the less I had a great time in all places.  I would have to say I enjoyed Seattle the most still.  I had not been to Vancouver since I was a boy so I didn’t remember much except for the Buchart Garden’s and the Suspension Bridge they are famous for in Victoria.  At night I thought the city was gorgeous but when day light hits I was disappointed with many of the buildings architecture.  For the most part they were dull and looked the same.  I also enjoyed Pike’s Market in Seattle and the Open Market in Vancouver as well.  That one thing I wish California had; well maybe we do but not to the same degree as Pike’s or the one in Vancouver.  If you go to Seattle during a warmer time of the year though, the market will be even more flooded and there will most likely be more merchants selling goods too. 

  Oregon and Vancouver Pubs are pretty good too, didn’t visit a whole lot of them but from my experiences and observations they seem pretty good.  Oregon also seems to have a lot of Taverns too!  Seattle is still one of the coolest cities I’ve been too.  I just love the down town area, the water front and just how the city is positioned in terms of the harbor.  One thing I do wish I had time for was capturing the city skyline, didn’t get around to doing that but thats ok.  This time around I go to take a Underground Tour of Seattle.  Learned a brief history of the city itself and how it came to be.  The tour being sort of a history recap it could seem boring but I fully enjoyed our very entertaining tour guide.  I swear she does stand up comedy as a side job too! =)  Another thing to note about down town Seattle is that it’s not like a lot of other cites you visit.  It’s decently spread out and the great part about down town Seattle is its mostly commercial, businesses, offices etc and NO Public Housing or at least hardly.  It not like SF where you go certain place and there are just districts of housing.  Seattle probably has some of that but certainly little to none from what I could see.

  Other things to note, make sure you change currency before you go to
  Canada, its just less of a pain to do it before hand in the US. 
  Canadian’s charge something like 4% for the conversion.  So I hear
  Canadian’s are not too fond of Americans?  I wonder why?  If you are
  Canadian please educate me!  Interestingly, Vancouver has almost 14%
  tax on things you buy, no wonder they all have health coverage there
  hahah!

  Overall, the trip was fun.  Thank’s Sarah for housing us in Portland
  and Thanks Bryce for arranging all the logistics and hooking us up,
  mucho eprops do you pal! =)  Make sure you bring a passport to Canada! 
  Most people are under the impression you can just show a driver’s
  license ID but new laws are going to be set where you must have a
  passport to visit Canada.  If you don’t, you’re wont be able to get
  back into the US. 

  Whelp, now it’s back to reality and my daily life! =) 

  Next destination…Indianapolis in March

  • 5:44 am
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