The Suite Life

The girls have really taken to Portland and hotel living. We're staying at the Residence Inn Riverplace and every morning little Sarah is the first one up ready to go downstairs to enjoy the breakfast buffet. Katie prefers to have her food brought up to her as to not disturb her morning leisure time. Syd just wants to push the elevator buttons.

We've managed to get out and see a few things. Thursday, while Larry went to the Portland office, we rode the bus to do a little window shopping before taking the Max up to the Zoo. The girls enjoyed people watching along the way as Portland has quite a bunch of eccletic souls. Katie now says she is either going to go to Clemson, Stanford or Portland State. I tried hard to bring back memories of the Zoo, but it all looked brand new to me. Our first order of business was to buy some sweatshirts. I seemed to have forgotten how chilly the Northwest is even in August. We then spent the next three hours exploring the beautiful zoo. The animals were out and about because it was cool. Quite a difference from southern zoos where they are all hiding in the shade moving as little as possible. Bears, elk, wolves, sea lions, elephants, penguins, tigers, rhinos, hippos, zebras and all kinds of birds drinking nectar from our hands. I even had a couple land on my shoulder.

Friday morning we lounged until Larry came back at lunch time. We then headed down the Riverwalk to a great festival called the 'Bite of Oregon' and we definitely took some bites. It's like Fall for Greenville with expanded menus and a HUGE wine tasting area. There are hundreds of vineyards in the area and Larry and I enjoyed trying many of them, while the girls enjoyed playing the new Wii Sport Resort games. We finished off the day with some Tillamook ice cream and a dip in the pool.

Saturday we drove down to Newport and went to the Oregon Coast Aquarium, Yaquina Head Lighthouse and Agate Beach. We liked the aquarium but it was the state park that got the girls' attention. They loved exploring the tidal pools, calling to the seals lounging on the rocks and counting all the starfish. It was something to see the seals swimming in the bay not a hundred yards from us. We took Rte.101 and 99W back to Portland and were awe struck by the views in Depoe Bay, Lincoln City and the valley with all of the vineyards. So beautiful...can't wait to see more.