Tag Archives: river

Aug16

Exploring Fort Stevens and Astoria and Portland… IN OREGON YO! This is my new JAM! – Day 3

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Exploring Fort Stevens and Astoria and Portland… IN OREGON YO! This is my new JAM! – Day 3

Friday, 19-June-2015

Today is the day.

I’ve been to Portland before… but Portland in Maine, not in Oregon. I’ve heard stories about Portland, Oregon, though… that it’s a mecca of adventure, that everyone is awesome, and that it’s the city that San Francisco wishes that it could be. That every restaurant is amazing, and that the cyclists are all strong and polite. Basically, that everyone loves Portland.

So… we had breakfast in Astoria instead. Because it was closer. And we were hungry.

We hit a place called Street 14 Cafe, which deserved a shout out due to the freaking amazing breakfast that they put together. Strong coffee, great sandwich, and good everything else. The Barista’s weren’t even snarky or rude, which was kind of confusing to the New Englander in me.

Then we screwed around at a toy shop, because it was there and we’d just watched a woman literally dance down the street and walk into the shop. And not the “do a little side-stop” dance. I mean full music-video, dancing-in-the-rain rocking out. Swinging on street lights. People be crazy happy here, I guess.

Anyways, we explored Astoria a little, then we left and went to Portland. The goal was to Kayak for the lunch-time hours, then head into town and explore a bit there. Then dinner, then drive on to our last night of camping before Hood River.

The Kayaking ended up starting a lot later than planned though, thanks to a rather ridiculous traffic jam that we all found ourselves in, driving into Portland itself. The cars got separated, but thankfully I was able to sneak ahead of the jam and get everything set up at the rental place by the time Mike and Liz pulled into the parking lot.

Instead of rocking the Kayaks, we chose a different tact this time – a single Canoe, so that we could stick a little closer together and still deal with pictures and fun and everything. And fun was had in buckets and bundles – especially when we found out that there was a restaurant right on the water, that catered to boats.

So… we tied up along side the dock, lashed the canoe in, and had burgers and drinks and snacks and…. ohh it was lovely. It was a super sunny day, just hot enough that we were happy to be on the water. And the food was good, and the birds… yeah, I think I saw my first bald eagle while we were paddling downriver.

The one downside was that we were in a canoe. Canoe’s are really hard to steer, compared to a kayak. So we basically zig-zagged our way down the river the whole time… not the worst thing ever, but remember that Mike and I are freaking kings of kayaking. So this silly inefficiency was really annoying to two guys used to chasing down sailboats and yelling pirate phrases at them as they steer away from us.

Meh, anyways. We paddled. We put ashore for a bit, walked around. Did some yoga on a floating log. Looked awesome. Saw bald eagles (again). And just… such a lovely day.

Then: Portland! We headed into a sushi restaurant that dancing-girl (remember her? The one from the toy shop in Astoria?) had recommended. They were popular too – we arrived pretty early, but there was already a solid line to get in. So we put our name in, found a wine bar, and got a flight of wines to try out.

It was a long and kind of strange wait, to be honest… we signed up, then had to come by and check back to see whether we’d been called or not. So kind of stressful, but thankfully the wine bar helped out a lot with that annoyance.

And the food helped too, once we were seated and served… holy crap, those rolls! They were actually honestly just too big, for the most part. They were delicious, but nearly too big to fit as a single bite. And no one wants to take sushi in multiple bites… it just stinks. No fun. So it was a challenge… but an acceptable one, since they were so tasty.

And then we paid. And then we drove some more.

And then we were in camp!

First, a quick note about the scenery down the Columbia Gorge. I’ve traveled a lot. By the time I drove out of Portland and into the Gorge, I’d been around the world. New Zealand, Zion, Joshua Tree, France, England and South America. I’ve seen sights and climbed places and explored. The views in the Colombia River Gorge make the list. They’re amazing – the water, the sun, the cliffs… it’s stellar.

Anyways, we made camp at Wyeth Campground, a place that was made by conscientious objectors to WWII. It was a bit rough due to there being no potable water, thanks to a bacteria bloom in the area. Thankfully, we had planned ahead and had an idea how to deal with that… we just drank beer instead!

So we set up camp, made a fire, and relaxed the way that one should relax when camping. Mike played guitar, Liz and I sang / played bongos, and just sat back and enjoyed the night. I’d gotten a real good fire going, since we didn’t need to conserve wood, so we kept it up late into the night, enjoying the scene and the woods.

That night was really the only night that was identical to the camping trips that Mike and I would take back in Mass. Liz did crash early in the evening, but the two of us stayed out and kept talking and blathering and complaining about the world, and talking excitedly about everything we were going to do in the near future.

It’s amazing to sync so well with someone, even after so long without seeing them. So we enjoyed the night, and didn’t worry about the time. I think it was something like 2 or 3 in the morning when we did finally crash… but since the next day was the final day of my trip, it didn’t really matter all that much, did it?

Oct12

Exploring the mountain streams of Venezuela

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I woke up when Ana nearly kicked the door in with the assistance of her friend Andrei. It was nearly noon, and I had slept through Savas getting up, his Dad leaving for work, and a huge pool party right outside. Damn but I’m good at sleeping. Respect.

Anyways, Ana Savas Andrei and I ate a quick breakfast and headed out to grab a small townie-bus up to the Barrio South of the city, up in the mountains. Now two definitions for you: the townie-bus? That’s a gutted molester-van with its windows knocked out and the engine barely running. But by god it made it up that mountain like nobody’s business, and it was DAMN awesome. And the Barrio? Think Favela’s of Brazil or the deeper ghetto’s of LA. Sketchy, but if you’re from there completely cool. And luckily for us, we were meeting two of Ana’s friends from the area; Yelvin and his younger brother.

 

After we got off the bus and did introductions we all started heading the rest of the way up the mountain to the main river. That was the goal of the day: hiking up the riverbed to a great swimming area that Yelvin knew. We walked through the Barrio for about ten minutes before breaking out into the river area; a lone water transfer station marking the end of town. I guess this river is the primary water source for the town, so the path that we took was actually a maintenance trail used to keep the water systems running. We took off our shoes as soon as we got to the river and headed up barefoot so that we could hop between the river and the path easier. The path itself swapped between concrete walkways with handrails, bare packed earth, and extremely sketchy rock traverses that wouldn’t be out of place climbing in New Hampshire. Thank you rock climbing, for letting me get across those without incident.

As we ascended we passed a good number of other folks bathing and hanging out. I guess Sunday is an international rest day, so there were a ton of families out with the kids and grills, swimming and cooking. I have no idea what kind of meat was being cooked (and don’t want to know), but damn it smelled good 🙂 The ascent took us about an hour, give or take, hiking through some of the most beautiful country-side that I’ve seen. The river had cut a valley through the mountain, and the steep sides were covered with fruit trees (none ripe yet, unfortunately), but the views were amazing. Another kind nice upside to where we were hiking is that, since it’s the main water supply, there were a good number of water transfer stations that we could drink out of. I tried to keep the drinking to a minimum to lower my painful-stomach-risk, but I will say that the water I drank was amazingly clear and crisp. We’ll see if I regret it in the future. (Editors note: He did regret it, but not too much so. A light case of bathroom “oh god why! Why hath thou forsaken me!”, but it only lasted for half a day or so, thanks to Azithro)

And then we were there: an opening in the river-bed had created a large area of shallows backed by an extremely deep section carved by a waterfall in the back. Perfect for cliff-jumping, though I’ll admit that I pansied out at the last minute and didn’t jump. We swam and chatted, climbed the side-walls and danced, and rocked out as befitting the perfect scenery surrounding us. The river was cold, according to my Venezuelan compatriots, but perfectly warm according to Bostonian water temperatures. I took the chance to give my dreads a good washing, took lots of pictures, and enjoyed the sensation of the riverbed between my toes. Sounds dumb, I know, but the riverbed was this amazing mix of clay and sand, so it felt really neat, especially on all the bug-bites that I’ve been getting.

Before headed out I was treated to an impromptu “new life ceremony” courtesy of Andrei; I guess the primary reason for walking up here today was so that he could “turn over a new leaf”, and start a new chapter in his life. I hadn’t realized when I met him, but this dreadlocked and tattoo’d guy had just turned 18, and so had decided that now was as good a time as ever to drop all his bad habits and rebuild his life to be a bit cleaner and simpler. Him, Yelvin and Savas all did a neat Hindu ceremony of… something… (not sure, sorry!) where he chopped off his dreads and all his hair, and discarded all of his vices: weed, cigarettes and booze specifically. Then, we burned it all. Luckily the smell of burning Wine, weed and tobbacco over-rode the smell of burning hair, so it wasn’t really that bad. And seeing him shaved completely bald was a rather interesting sight. The guy who had looked a bit like Bob Marly not half an hour earlier now looked like Aang from Avatar. Creepy… but kinda funny too 🙂

After the ceremony we headed back down to the Barrio for some well earned snacks. I’ll admit, when Yelvin started asking around for something, getting directions and furtive answers from the residents of the barrio, I was half convinced we were trying to find the resident coke-dealer. Turns out the target of his hunt wasn’t the resident DRUG dealer, but the resident POPSICLE dealer, and I was treated to an amazing chocolate-milk pop. Awesome!

While cooling off with the pops we took another sketchy bus back down to La Guira, and headed towards the closest surfers-only beach. I guess bathing in the ocean is a fairly normal occurance, so this beach had huge signs all over reminding people that they can’t get naked and get their soap on here, it’s a strictly surfer-dude-only atmosphere up in here. Kinda nice, I’ll never complain about not seeing naked old dudes, and seeing smoking-hot surfer chicks instead. And do not forget this one fact: Venezuelan women are HOT. Like… holy hell. Thank you, whoever invented the itty-bitty bikini 🙂

The beach was quite excellent, but before long the sun was setting and I was getting on the bus headed back to Caracas so that I could head back to the hostel to prep for my flight to Buenos Aires. Ana and I had planned on going to a concert that night, but when we learned it was nearly 400 Bolivar (only $50, but I didn’t have that much changed) we bailed on it, since we couldn’t find anyone to change the cash. Thus, the bus ride was solo for me, though I think I was technically in a threesome on the way back… The folks sitting next to me were a surfer couple who were, literally, having sex next to me. And by “next to” I mean “his leg pressed up against mine thanks to the small seat,and half of her ass-cheek on my lap”. Yeah… awkward, but I won’t complain since she was, as I stated before, quite hot.

After getting back into the city I unsuccessfully hunted for the Metro… I had intended on getting off at Gato Negro, one of the main metro stops, but either I had missed it, the bus driver was wrong, or it was closed. I’m leaning towards the later, since I did find an obvious station that was quite definitely closed. So a little scared and worried (since it was night, and the area looked pretty bad) I did what any red-blooded Jewish-American boy would do: I ordered myself a fucking HOT DOG. WITH EVERYTHING. And, much like the hamburger of yesterday, everything means everything in Venezuela, and this thing had condoments all up in its business; they ran the gamut from onions and cheese to mayo and french-fries. And damn but it was good.

My belly full and my mind distracted from my predicament, I went about solving my problem. Keeping my head on a swivel and dodging around the sketchier groups of people (I did get a few called of “Hey! Gringo!” from the groups, which I ignored) I picked out the best looking cab and jumped in, telling him the closest metro station to where I wanted to go. On the ride we chatted (my Spanish is getting better yay!), and I found out that he studies at the university near my Hostel, that he wants to visit the US, and that his English was impressively bad. Almost as bad as my Spanish 😛

But soon the ride was over, my adventures for the evening completed. I settled into the Hostel, watching some stupid Youtube clips and typing up some stories.