On the Oregon Trail.....

Happy July 1st!  Here we are waking up in beautiful downtown Portland.  And it's a sunny day!  When we get our act together we will be off to the coast for a few days.

The morning we left Boise (heard on the news that it is pronounced Boicy....one lady was very upset that people pronounce it Boizy...who knew?) we decided to get Lexi washed.  Yes, we name our cars!  :-)  Anyhow, she was sooooo dusty from days and days on the open road.  We walked out, she looked like a new car, and it started to rain!  And it rained off and on the whole day.  Figures!  First rain we'd seen since leaving home.  We hadn't even had a cloudy day and so we were due!  Didn't bother us.  We stopped just outside Portland that nite and had fabulous salmon at Salty's on the River.  Yummm!!!

Then we drove into Portland and spent the day and nite downtown.  We rode one of those "Hop On, Hop Off" trolleys.  Those are such a great way to get yourself acquainted quickly with a city.  So we actually stayed on until the last stop and then got off and walked all over the city.  Beautiful city!  Love all the tree-lined streets.  Found a wonderful restaurant for a late lunch - Jake's Grill.  It was an old hotel with the rich dark wood - perfect for a gray day.  They were playing music from the 40's....loved it!  Perfect!  Found out later that it is owned by McCormick and Schmick.

Then we found the big Columbia store.  Both walked out with new walking shoes and they are like wearing slippers!  Highly recommend them!!!  They're called Tech-Lite.  Now we're ready to walk all over Oregon!

This morning we're heading over to the coast and starting up in the farthest corner in Astoria.  Looking forward to our trip down the coast!  Finding that there is soooo much to see in Oregon that I don't think we allowed ourselves enough time.  We'll just have to do our best!  :-)

Until our next blog.....Happy 4th of July weekend!!!

 Great seafood dinner at Salty's in Portland..

 Jan found a new friend in Portland

 Gerry just can't wait to get started on the Greyline tour of Portland.

 Hard to believe it's summertime when the temperature is 63 degrees at 1:45 pm

 One of our best dining experiences thur far.  This is Jake's Grill in Portland.  Brings to mind the old time  eating establishments.  Jake's is the forerunner to McCormick and Schmick's.  Either Mr. McCormick or Mr. Schmick was in the bar but we missed talking with him by a few minutes.  

 Portland's downtown is really beautiful with tree lined streets.

Flowers were all over the city. While this is not a rose, Portland is known as the City of Roses... bet you didn't know that!