Post PCT - Portland

I got the bus to Portland from Seattle at 1pm so I spend few remaining hours walking around the city, had a delicious meal consisting of Kung Pao chicken, Mongolian beef and steamed rice at Uwajimaya in Japanese town near the bus stop. After that as I was sitting in the shade provided by the supermarket, three people walking out of it offered me food and drink, I must have looked especially rough that morning.

Flix bus arrived on time and it took three hours to get to Portland. Once here I called Sketch on his landline but he wasn't answering, so I texted his friend Gnarly to ask for the address, I got it but Gnarly said that Sketch has some errands to run and he won't be home for the next three hours. I started to have an impression that Sketch didn't really want me to stay at his place, haha. So I browsed for hostels in the area, luckily there was one called Lolo Pass, quite cheap (35$ per night) and not that far from the city centre. I ended up going there instead for the next two nights.

Following morning I went for a sightseeing tour around the city, first stop was OMSI - Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, I ended up buying the ticket to see USS Blueback submarine and it was totally worth 8.5$ After that I went through the Tilikum bridge and took a green line tram to the centre. As I arrived here the Tuesday midday concert of the band called Chasing Ebenezer was just about to start so I sat down on the brick wall listening to their rock folk music for about half an hour. Then I took another tram to the Washington Park and walked the Maple Trail to the International Rose Test Garden, Japanese Garden (which was closed) and Holocaust Memorial. The park itself was great, I could easily spend here the whole day walking all the different tree themed trails and gardens.

Next thing on the list was Powell's Books, Portland's huge bookstore located in the city centre, it was selling new and second hand books alongside each other which was a nice touch. I also went to the REI outdoor store to get new pair of shoes and ended up getting La Sportivas very similar to the ones I finished PCT in, they were on a 40% end of the line discount. REI was also selling second hand shoes and I was pondering to get a pair of Altras for 25$ for a while but decided against it.

Last stop for the day was the Union Station where I got the ticket to a coastal town of Warrenton for the next day, the whole Old Town area including the station was heavily populated by homeless people and although I've seen the same scenes in all the US cities I been so far, there seemed to be way more of them here. It's sad to see people of all ages on the streets and it makes you wonder what circumstances brought them here.

At this point my tour of the city was over although I could see myself spending here another day or two as I quite liked the vibe of it despite its obvious problems. I ended up finishing the day drinking PBR's and browsing through Netflix in hostels common area where a drunk old lady started to hit on me talking complete nonsense about her being agent for the aliens and that they are keeping the world's peace also how she travelled the world when she was just 14. I was listening to her bubble for about an hour as I though it was quite cute until I got rescued by another person joining the conversation. From here it was bed time, I set the alarm for 6:30am and joined 5 other snoring guys in my 8 person shared room which looked and smelled like a hospital ward but hey it was clean, cheap and the bed was quite comfortable.

USS Blueback:
Holocaust memorial:

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