From: "Philip Merryman" <phil_merryman@hotmail.com>

Date: Sat May 04, 2002 08:34:01 PM Etc/GMT

Subject: South by NorthWest

Hi from SF!!

I reached San Francisco this morning after an overnight train trip and a shuttle bus across the bay bridge from Emeryville. Despite eventually getting to the hostel 3 hours later than scheduled it was still only 11:30am and I cannot check in until 2:30pm! So I can now update you on Portland. However one of the first things I found out on the internet when I looked this morning is more bad news: Arsenal won the FA Cup!! :-(

Anyway, back to Portland. Like Seattle I had a contact here too. I had been there 18 months ago to visit the local office of the company I worked for in Holland: Rational Software. This was the West Coast office for supporting my product. One of my colleagues there, Marek, had offered to show me around so this was another offer I gladly accepted. My last visit was to the office some miles out of the town centre itself, and I had only seen downtown in the dark!

So having checked in to the hostel I rang him up to arrange what to do. We agreed to meet up that evening. However the first thing to get done was to sort out the problem with my camera and film. Marek had suggested a good camera shop, so I went there. They got the film out OK but I was too late in the day to get it developed on the same day, so I left it with them to collect the next day. But at least I could take pictures again. I wandered round downtown a bit to get my bearings before meeting Marek. By then it was early evening and we were both getting hungry, so we went to a pizza place with a Micro-Brewery! There are many such little breweries here, as I has discovered on my last visit! Also the beer they produce is a similar style to English Beer!! :-) This place provided a sampler option of 7 small glasses of each one they do. So there was no contest as to what to order!! After there Marek took me to a viewpoint, Joseph Hill Park (if I remember it correctly) with a splendid view all around of the city lights. Then to a coffee shop (NOT like in Amsterdam! :-) ) called Rimsky's. Here there was always little surprises: no two chairs were the same and the table next to ours went slowly up and down! Apparently another one slowly rotates, so you have to keep an eye or your food & drinks! Ours seemed normal!

Next day after a quiet morning, back to downtown library (where I sent the e-mails from), a splendid building inside and out, and another explore of the centre before collecting my film. Mercifully all OK (Phew!) so unless I lose the pictures I will not need to wait another 13 years to get that photo in Vancouver!! I then went into the company office for a couple of hours at the end of the day to meet my former colleagues. I was especially impressed that the young lady (Tiffany) on reception was not only still there are 18 months but said: "Haven't you been here before?". Marek gave me the traditional Rational Walk Around given to new staff to meet their colleagues!! :-) It was good to see some of the old faces again, and to put faces to the new names I had come across before I left. Just to show off a bit I wore the company's SCP shirt!!! (Former colleagues will understand what I mean)

From there he took me to some friends of his out in the country. Marek is originally from Poland and it is approaching the Polish day of independence. His friends were of Polish origin too so they and their children were practicing dances and music for the day. They lived in a splendid house on 20 acres in the wood by the river. They even had their own saw mill. Not bad for a c++ programmer!!!

My last day in Portland Marek took the afternoon off work to be my tour guide. As before I went into downtown and met him there at lunchtime. From there we went out along the highway on the South side (Oregon) of the Columbia gorge to the Multnomah Falls. These are very impressive being over 600ft (200m) high and most of it a vertical drop. It is also right by the road, so very accessible. From there we went further up the gorge and crossed over to the North (Washington). Up in a hill high above the gorge, in a howling wind, is a replica Stonehenge!! It is built of stone blocks and is a full size copy of how it must have been when it was complete. It was built by a wealthy local man as a war memorial after the Great War. However it was fascinating to see as I regularly drove past the original on the A303, but had not been in to see it for over 20 years! You cannot walk round inside the original now (you could when I visited) so it was interesting to walk around the replica.

Next day another leisurely start as the train left just after 2pm. So back on the bulked up double decker busses for the journey to SF. Again the train was barely half full (it is still early in the season) and most got off before needing to spend the night (there were plenty in the sleepers apparently). So I had as good a night's sleep as I could expect spread across 2 seats. They were working on the track so the train gradually got later as we progressed, ending up nearly 2 hours late at one point. However I did not mind as this meant getting off at a slightly more civilised hour this morning. I saw a California dawn from the train: a big red sun rising through the mist. There is a bus connection from Emeryville, across the bay, to SF. However there was all sorts of confusion as a big cruise ship is in and the bus had to make an extra stop to drop some of the people off for the ship. The driver pulled up at the pier to be told that she needed to go into the entrance only a few yards behind, but that she was not allowed to back up and had to go round several city blocks to get back! So this added even more delay! So I eventually got to the hostel at about 11:30am instead of 8:30 am. But as I said at the top, I can't check in to 2:30 anyway, so in the end it was better than hanging around the foyer needing a wash for 6 hours (I still do, but only 1 hour to go now!!)

So, now you are as up to date as it is possible to get!!!

Share & Enjoy

Phil