We went for a walk along the Willamette River this morning and came upon the Portland Dragonboat Festival. Now that is the sign of a vibrant city: You are just out walking, and you discover a festival with a few thousand people participating. We watched dragon boat races in 2014 in Florence, Alabama, so we were glad to see this northwest version. There were teams from TX, CA, and BC here. There was a women's division and a mixed division. The teams from Alabama would have fit right in.
My favorite team name was Blazing Paddles.
After walking a couple of miles, we returned to the car and went in search of Portlandia, not the TV show, the statue. Portlandia is the second largest copper repoussé statue in the United States, after the Statue of Liberty. Repoussé means the metal was shaped by hammering from the reverse side. The sculptor, Raymond Kaskey, holds the copyright on his statue tightly and will not let Portlandia be used often, so it is not a well known statue. It's on the Portland Building downtown. That building is "an icon of postmodern architecture" designed by Michael Graves, which opened in 1982. Portlandia was installed above the front entrance in 1985.
I learned this morning that post modern features on the Portland Building include the colors,
the small windows, the protrusions, and the diagonal line.
We came home for lunch (sandwiches with tomatoes from the yesterday's market) and naps. Here's a
photo of our airbnb location.
Our apartment is on the ground floor, behind the turquoise door.
Our airbnb host, David, recommended a walk along Hawthorne Street, four blocks away. So we headed that way around 4:00 pm. What a great suggestion! There were wonderful shops to wander through, including Powell Books (the original store is downtown, but this one was plenty big). Shop names and displays grabbed my imagination immediately, and I took photos of a few.
The Bagdad is a bar and a movie theatre.
A hat store called The Classic Collection.
A coffee shop.
We ate Mexican food and had margaritas for just $2.50 (happy hour) before walking home.
The trees on our street are starting to turn.
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