“Keep Portland Weird”

We saw this slogan on a large sign in the inner suburbs of Portland Oregon. From the few things that we saw they seem to be making a red hot go of it too. Probably the best example was a group of ‘young people’ playing pavement chess in a city square. A number of them were wearing furry hats with pointy ears, and large bushy fox-like tails. One of the males in the group was wearing a light blue hat with ears, and a bright red tight satin mini-dress. We didn’t like to ask.

We spent most of our first day at Washington Park in the hills above the city. We first visited the International Rose Test Garden – only adventurous, brave alpha-roses need apply for the dangerous job of being a Test Rose. From here there are great views over the city and on a clear day you can see the summit of Mt Hood, but we had a cloudy one so no mountain views. Never mind. We took a wee steam train through the forest to the Zoo so that Mike could take pictures of bears to use in dodgied up photos later on. (Shouldn’t have told you that.) At the zoo we saw many exotic and brightly plumed creatures, and I’m not talking about the animals. Brightly coloured hair and full-body tattoos seemed to be the uniform of the masses (“We’re all individuals!”). We went to the Forestry Centre where we got to use a machine to chop down trees (in a simulator) – I narrowly missed killing myself by dropping a tree inches from the truck cabin. I have now discarded this as a career option on the grounds of startling incompetence.

Day 2 was spent along the Columbia River Gorge visiting several of the 77 waterfalls along the river. The No 1 attraction is the Multnomah Falls which are indeed impressive. Apart from waterfalls we were intrigued by the intriguing Banana Slug, which we at first mis-identified as a piece of poo.

Deirdre's "Service Slug"

Multnomah Falls

Multnomah Falls detail

Bridal Veil Falls

I must take a short side-track here to discuss the burning issue of ‘Service Animals’ which from my viewpoint appears to be a giant rort in order for people to get their beloved animals into places that would normally ban them. Our interest was piqued in Grand Canyon with a fit and strapping young lad taking his badly behaved dog onto the park shuttle and claiming it as a ‘service dog’.  Hmmm. I did a bit of internet searching and it seems that you can claim any animal as a service animal and no-one can challenge you as that would be discriminatory. You can get your pet a special vest to wear just to make it all official.  We have seen several questionable service animals since then. One dog had a backpack for carrying medication – hasn’t the apparently fit and healthy owner heard of a handbag? We then thought that we were being unfair – the dog must be a fully trained paramedic that can do ‘snout to mouth’ resus, use a defibrillator and intubate (well at least he could if he had opposable thumbs). 

As we were boarding a flight, a couple were sitting in wheelchairs waiting to be assisted to board. The woman was holding a large basket from which loud miaowing sounds were emanating. She told us all that this was a ‘service cat’. A service cat??? Can just imagine starting the day’s routine…..”Hey Fluffy, where are you taking me today? Oh great, the couch again.”

Anyway, the relevance of all that to this piece about Portland……. On one of our waterfall walks, we came across a couple with a (wait for it…) Service Goat, wearing an official vest and all. The mind boggles.

Ah Portland, keeping it weird. 

Mike asked for some bread to go with his soup!!