A couple of weekends ago, I visited my brother Nick in Portland. It was a dominating weekend consisting of mountain climbing, beer festival drinking, and gun shooting — and in that order too, but with time to sober up in between!
I flew in on Thursday, checked out my brother’s awesome house, and then headed over to Last Thursday, which is an art festival in the Alberta District of Portland. Portland was just as goofy and full of hippies as I had remembered from my trip 3 years ago (album 1, album 2… note the night of album 2 was quite interesting).
On Friday, we had some delicious Thai food in downtown Portland (this city has by far the best Thai food), and then headed on over to Saddle Mountain, which is a relatively easy-to-climb mountain with some incredible views. After walking with Nick for a bit, I cranked up the tunes and turned up the mountain.
Saddle Mountain was my first-ever summit, and to be honest with you, it might be my last. I do not like cliffs, and I do not like the possibility of falling down one. Now that I’m at sea level, it seems fine, but I was definitely apprehensive up there. Perhaps this is part of the rush, but I think I’d rather hang out in the water or the sand.
On Saturday, we headed to the Oregon Brewer’s Festival, which had some incredible beers! My favorite two were Golden Valley Brewery’s Red Thistle Quercus and 21st Amendment’s Watermelon Wheat, which wasn’t too melony but had just enough to be dangerous.
After a day of drinking 8% beers, we headed to Steve‘s house to enjoy a delicious dinner cooked by his girlfriend Adrienne. It wouldn’t be a trip visiting Nick if I didn’t get to hang with Alex, who I seem to bump into in every interesting mid-sized town (Portland, Memphis, Austin).
After a 12 hour drinking streak, what’s the next thing to do? Naturally, you scrape yourself up and go shoot guns! We headed over to an outdoor shooting range in Vancouver, WA, and tested out a glock. I completely sucked, but it was extremely fun after getting the hang of it. I plan on owning a few guns someday, and it was a great introduction.
Our time in Portland was incredibly busy and ridiculously fun – Thanks Nick!
See the full photo album here.
By The Arf August 9, 2007 - 1:30 am
ahh, those were the days. The Andes, Everest, Whitney, McKinley ect.. But the best I did was Murray Hill in Cleveland. Sounds like a blast (no pun intended) shooting .