Chuck, Blenno, Lauren and AB came to visit at various stages this weekend. Lauren and Blenno have been travelling around America, AB came over from Zurich for SOSP (which starts on Monday) and Chuck came up from San Francisco just for the hell of it. A _good_ weekend (if you don’t count the hangover!). On Friday night, Lauren, Blenno, Chuck and I met up with Wes for a few beers in the city. We ended up going down to Shanghai, which is a bar built in the tunnels where drunks were accosted and taken to ships to work as slaves (in the 1800s). The people below would open trap doors and pull them down. Cool ambience.
On Saturday, we headed out to the Mt St Helens volcano. It errupted in 1980, blowing itself apart. One side of the mountain is now missing, as is 1200 feet from its peak. I say missing, but I really mean that its distributed over the area around. The snow covered crater was steaming, and has been for the last three years. This thing is anything but dormant! Blenno, Lauren, Chuck and I drove up there in Brie’s kindly donated car. After a few wrong turns (I blame Chuck, he blames me, its one big happy family!), we made it out onto the freeway and, following the turnoff, enjoyed some spectacular views of the mountain and its surrounds. The visitor’s centre was quite cool, and I worked on a few shots with my swanky new camera (Canon Digital Rebel XTi with a 17-85mm IS USM lens, for the photography geeks). After engorging ourselves on the view, we drove a way back down the mountain to sit where a river of mud had flown, carrying part of the mountain down the valley. We ate lunch. At 4:00.
After driving back, we headed to Henry’s, which is a very cool bar, which demonstrates the best of Portland produce: 100 or so beer taps with beers provided mostly by the local microbreweries (and its _good_). AB and Wes joined us. The rest of the night is a blur, catching up, reminiscing, and generally having a good time. After a slight hiccup involving the misplacement of my house keys (to be found, the next morning, in the car) and Lauren deftly climbing through a 1st storey window, we tucked in for a decent sleep.
The hangover the next morning wasn’t so good, although it was quelled by a trip to the Tin Shed Cafe in East Portland. I’d been once before, but it was just as good the second time around. They do really great food, relaxed atmosphere -- the 30 minute wait to get in was worth it.
Following a seriously good breakfast (at 11:30), we hopped in the cars again and headed up to Mount Hood. Its an 11,000 foot mountain, which was obviously once a volcano, near Portland. We drove up to Timberline lodge, which is an amazing building which forms the bulk of a ski resort. We walked up the ski lift about as far as we could go, taking pictures and generally enjoying being out on the mountain. We all managed to fall in the snow, soaking our shoes and clothes, but generally enjoying ourselves!
After losing the path various times, but making it up to the hut at the top, we soaked up the view before heading down to Timberline for soup and tea. All good! Lauren and Blenno undertook the return of Brie’s car, and Andrew, Chuck and I headed onward to Skamania Lodge for SOSP: _the_ OS conference.
