Tag: walks

A Forest Grove Walk

I got up early and headed out to a coffee shop to get some breakfast. On my way, I caught the sun coming up in this reflection.

And here is the sunrise from the other direction.

The coffee shop’s website said it opened at 6 a.m. and when I walked by the previous evening, so did the hours posted on the door. I got there at 6 a.m., though and no one was about. Employees unlocked the door at 7 a.m. While I understand that there might be some barrier to updating a website, I think posting a sign with current hours on the door is something that was doable. At least there was a chair outside for me to sit in while I waited.

However, the breakfast sandwich I ate was delicious (as was the tea) and all was forgiven.

I ate my breakfast in the Magic Flute room, one of my favorite at McMenamins. I also caught up on correspondence.

I’m nearly to the end of this batch of notecards, which is too bad, because I love them so much. They were a very good find at Scrap. It’s fun to see how many things have changed. On the right side of this drawing, you can see the Armory is still painted white. It hadn’t yet been taken over by Portland Center Stage.

9:15 a.m. was my soaking pool time. I had to reserve the time before I arrived. This was a great soaking pool experience, because no other people appeared. My reservation for 8:00 p.m. the night before, I skipped. I went down at my appointed time, but there were much too many people and too many people without masks. Today it was just me. I swam. It was a head-above-water breaststroke, but swimming nonetheless.

The chickens and I chatted for a bit before I went on a walk.

The movie theater is closed, which was to be expected. I took a closer look at the posters.

From the future, I can tell you that Free Guy was really released on August 13, 2021, not July 3, 2020.

Onward probably did play at this theater, because it was one of the last big releases before everything shut down. The Woman in the Window was released on Netflix on May 14, 2021.

I wondered if these two Forest Grove High School graduates knew each other. Were they neighbors who ignored each other or best friends? There’s a YA novel in this photo.

Here’s a Mondrian-style truck and camper. Very cool.

Aside from the fact I forgot to start my activity tracker until after I’d already walked an hour, this was a lovely walk.

It Really Snowed!

I assumed we would get the usual light dusting, but the snow turned into a proper snowstorm. There was shoveling to be done!

We went on an early morning walk and here’s what we saw:

This friend knows how to protect the windshield wipers against the dreaded ice.

We found whole blocks with no footprints! Very exciting. We also mailed some letters and did a bit of shopping at Fred Meyer. I came home soaked in sweat. Walking through snow is a workout!

I enjoyed these carrot tops in the window of a Kenton restaurant.

A Walk in the Columbia Children’s Arboretum

Here’s a timer photo in front of the sign (and the bag of trash someone left.)

The Arboretum was peaceful and quiet and I’m glad I finally located it after all these years. There was an attempt to find it via bicycle in the early aughts and no dice. But this time, it was no trouble to find it.

Someone had been busy constructing this structure.

Hike at Tryon Creek

We haven’t been to Tryon Creek in years. I think the last time we were there we got lost, and it was a slog through the rain. But today’s hike was fun, and short. You can see Matt holding his mask. We would put them on when we encountered other hikers.

I loved this nurse log.

And! When we were leaving, we ran into a parent from my days at the Emerson School; it was great to catch up.

Little Free Library: Recommending a Book

As part of my morning walks that have replaced morning swims, I’ve been making the rounds of the Little Free Libraries near me. There are about six that are easy to swing by regularly. I drop off books, see if anything has appeared I want to read, and tidy the shelves.

This book has been in this Little Free Library since March. I’ve read it, it’s the second of a multi-book series about a family living in California that begins with the San Francisco earthquake. I read the series in the 90s and really enjoyed it. The last book is memorable because there was a major typo near the end that had a character dying three weeks before the book killed her off.

Clearly the book’s presentation wasn’t turning any heads, so I wrote up a recommendation, added it to the book, and set the book front and center when I tidied.

Reporting from the future, I can tell you that even with my recommendation this book sat around for a few more months before it disappeared.

If you are interested in reading the series, the first book is called The Immigrants. I’ve just looked at the original cover of that book, and it has a similar style of cover, but with a half-naked woman among the mix. Apparently (and perhaps because of that?) The Immigrants was adapted into a miniseries in 1978.

My Vision, Manifested

As I walk around my neighborhood, I make plans for the houses I encounter. The tiny house in this picture, I’ve always planned to buy, move into, and then use the huge open space in the lot to grow a million vegetables.

Mostly those plans are scrapped when the property is sold, the small house is torn down, and what is built leaves no room for gardening. You can see that has happened on the lot next door, where the blue house dominates.

So you can imagine my thrill when these marigolds appeared in this lot. It’s not oodles of vegetables, but it’s close.

Out and About in North Portland

This is my first time walking on this sidewalk. Prior to this building being built, I had no reason to walk on this side of the street as it was fenced off, and maybe it didn’t have a sidewalk? But now the corner of N. Interstate and N. Argyle Street has a huge affordable housing complex, which I’m quite happy to see. And the sidewalk is great for walking on.

This house has been one of my favorites. It’s just down the street, anchoring N. Watts, right before the street loops and turns into N. Minnesota for one short block. When I first moved to the neighborhood, I’d guess that the house was owned by an older couple. They did a great job keeping it tidy, and they planted a garden in the empty adjacent lot every spring.

The house has been sold and the new owners aren’t as fastidious. [Checks Portland Maps] As I suspected, it’s owned by the Gates Family Trust, and the address is out of state. So it’s a rental. They’ve also sectioned off the lot next door, which sold for $74,900 in 2015. The owners of the lot aren’t fastidious at all, nor do they plant a vegetable garden. Instead, they seem to apply pesticides to kill the weeds now and then.

The sale of this section of land had me crossing the little green house off my list of next places to potentially live. I wouldn’t want to move in and then immediately have all my light blocked by new construction.