Biking in our primes

March 21, 2018

Friday is an exciting day for Team Anderson. It’s Rachael’s birthday, which is excitement enough. We have big plans for the day, starting with breakfast. It’s Rachael’s choice, of course, and she chooses to go to the Bijou Cafe - a great spot in Old Town we haven’t been to in years for some reason. We have a history with the Bijou, dating back to the years when we still lived in Salem. Our idea of a great weekend was to take the train to Portland, stay at Day’s Inn for a night or two (now the renovated, much classier Hotel Modera); take in a play in the evening; walk down to the Bijou for a great breakfast; and then bike the 60-70 miles back home. After several years of this we eventually realized that we loved Portland and started plotting our move north.

Next, weather permitting, we’ll go on a bike ride together somewhere TBD - the route will be Rachael’s choice, of course. At the moment it looks like weather may not permit, or at least not encourage; but it’s too soon to be certain.

And, in the evening, we’re both really excited to be going to a performance by John Gorka, at Alberta Rose. Gorka is one of Rachael’s favorite musicians, and we haven’t seen him in several years - the last time he came to Portland, we were in Europe. She can hardly believe he’s coming here on her birthday!

So that’s exciting, I’m sure you’ll agree. Even better though, Rachael’s new age will be a prime number. And best of all, mine is also a prime number. For the next 248 days, we’ll both be in our primes! This is becoming an increasingly rare event the older we get, so we should do something really special to commemorate it. We think a suitable plan would be to go for a bike ride, in (in order):

USA
Greece
Albania
Canada
Croatia
Slovenia (very briefly)
Italy
France
Spain.

So the big day will come Friday, but there’s nothing new to report today - no new photos, in other words. As long as I’ve got your attention though, here’s a brief status report on The Big Project:

We’ve competed our month-plus stay at Stacey’s, and are now nearing the end of a two week residence at Tiffany’s, another Airbnb near Mount Tabor. Tiffany’s basement really suits us better than Stacey’s attic, in several ways - enough so that we’ve rebooked it for our landing pad when we return from Albania in June.
Sunday, we leave Tiffany’s and head down to Eugene to pick up our new Bike Fridays. We’ll be down there for five nights and take in some day rides in a part of the state we don’t spend time in often enough.
After Eugene, we’re flying back to Minnesota to visit our son and granddaughters; then, back to yet a third Airbnb, this one in Sellwood. Then, finally, we fly out to Chania.
And how’s that condo sale going, you ask? Good news, bad news, good news. The good news: as previously reported, we received a good cash offer almost immediately after the unit went on the market. The bad news: these prospective buyers backed out last weekend. The latest good news: within a day, we received a different, better cash offer from a resident of the building that has been waiting for years for a larger unit to open up. So, we’re hopeful but a bit anxious.

Well, it just doesn’t feel right to have a text-only post; so here are some pics from a ride from about two weeks ago that I never blogged. A nice ride: up at the crack of dawn, I stopped at Water Avenue Coffee to wait for the day to warm up before setting out on a 30 mile loop that took me along the base of Washington Park on unpaved Leif Erickson Drive, and then back to town along Skyline Drive. Cold, dry, beautiful. At the end, I stopped in at the zoo to pick up tickets for a pair of concerts this summer for the brief periods when we’ll be back in town.

I’ve really been enjoying living on the east side of the river for the past month, seeing the skyline differently in the mornings.

Water Avenue Coffee, one of my favorite watering holes lately

The Hawthorne Bridge, the city, the bikes

Back to the Ross Island gravel quarry for a fresh load

The view across North Portland from the Vaughn Street Bridge: Mount Saint Helens, with Mount Rainier in the distance

A redhead and a dog, Leif Erickson Drive

On Leif Erickson Drive: a beautiful ride, once it’s dried out

Atop Skyline Drive, looking northeast from Mount Calvary Cemetary

I don’t need to tell you again what we’re looking at here, do I?

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