Portland, Oregon

A snapshot of my collection of memorabilia from our Portland adventures, starting with Easter, Powell's books, Stumptown Coffee Downtown(see more pics here), Mother's Bistro and Bar,where we had the famous french toast encrusted in corn flakes.  Oh so good. Habibi Lebonese food for lunch.  We went here while shopping, and had a tremendously delicious meal, very inexpensive, and particularly good.  Turn's out their second location was a block from our hotel, Doc Martens, such a Portland natural.  Random Order Coffeehouse and bakery makes incredible and award winning pies.  It's a coffee house in the true sense of the word.  Vintage clothes shopping, my favorite is Lulu's.  A couple other fun places, with an interesting twist:  Lulu's- upscale vintage clothing, super nice and informed staff(owners) and Kirsty's nickname, Lulu and SaySay- trendy clothing boutique and Sarah's nickname, also a fun shop, with the owner as sales staff.

Stumptown is Portland.  It's so Portland.  Awesome coffee, sassy atmosphere, stripped down, but elegant.  Fancy, yet not pretentious.  Dependable and yet sassy.  That's our hotel across the street.  Everywhere in town sells Stumptown coffee.  It's delicious and a mainstay for grey days.

As much as these are unique bikes, they are typical in Portland.  Utilitarian, yet customized.  Definitely a free spirited and energized vibe.

Crazy.  Not sure what this one is designed for.  Just because?  Note the poster on the ground.  I think it was celebrating the 100th year of the Titanic.

 Really enjoyed the bikes in town.  Here's another special one.  Be line pdx is a zero carbon emission delivery service and advertising all based on these tricycles.  Awesome!  That battery is for a little assist if needed.  What a blast to work for this company.  They've partnered with big and small companies like Whole Foods and Office Max, as well as local bakers and others.  Another fascinating area they are addressing is delivering donated perishable food to food banks and shelters.  Wow.  Talk about making a difference.  It's pretty exciting, and seems like such a natural in Portland.

Pizza Orgasmica, San Rafael, CA (and Stinson Beach, CA)

We had a nice hike up the beach today.  That's Bolinas on the other side of the lagoon.  It's a beautiful place here, at Stinson Beach.  We're on the edge of town, at the end of the spit.  So tranquil, yet beautifully exciting.  There are so few people over here, which makes you just want to smile and appreciate how good life is.    How small is it, you ask?  Last night, we walked into town for dinner a little after  8:00pm, to the Sand Dollar restaurant and they had to make a decision whether to stay open for us.  They said yes, happily, and we knew they would.  :-)

I'm trying to learn to use depth of field to get focus at a point and out of focus everywhere else by using a high or large Fstop value.  It's not working.  Apparently, it's easier if there is less light.  Anyways, I'll keep trying.  See any shells in there?

Here's another one where it would have been fun to have these little guys in focus, going to blurry in the ocean.

This is a glimpse of the stunning beauty here, the Bolinas/Stinson lagoon in the foreground, mr pelican overhead, and the marin headlands in the background. 

You might be recognizing Bolinas in the background, and this (guessing) native purple beauty in front.

Purple flowers up close.  Such a vibrant color against the backdrop of the beach colors.  Isn't nature grand?

Here's another bit of mother nature doing her thing.  This is a huge tree, half of it hanging over the lagoon, with roots 'looking' everywhere for a place to dig in.  It does not phase the tree one bit.  He's huge!  And growing straight and strong and tall.  Cool.

All I can say is, the circle of life.  This is what's left of a spotted shark on the beach. Nice looking, even at this point in it's decomposition.  He's about 2 feet long I would say.

Here's the essence of the Stinson artist community.  I love the colors and textures of this sculpture made of found pieces of nature and man's refuse.  In the nest were, I am guessing contributions from the unknown artist and those who wanted to add-on, including rocks that looked like eggs, crab shells and other items.

Kirsty and her dog, Ellie.  Both in their sweet pot, loving life.  Such a happy place.  We are so lucky.

Jib Jab
We're learning. 

We went up to the beach this time, with no food.  No drinks.  No extra clothes.  We did bring sheets and pillows, but that's it, for a three day visit.  Turns out there was a nice bottle of Moet Chandon on ice in the fridge (who left that? we're going to replace it, and thank you, what a great idea and treat).  It was nice to finish it in the morning.  There was also coffee, whew.  It makes everything better.  Less time to get there.  Less time to clean.  Less decisions.  Less is better.

Pizza Orgasmica and Brewing Company in San Rafael, CA
Okay, I would be remiss, not providing details of a super fun lunch I had in San Rafael, in one of my favorite places on the planet (Marin), Pizza Orgaasmica is on Fourth and Lincoln.  Like any good pizza place, but so so so much better.  Yes, they make their own beer.  Yes, they make really nice pizza from great ingredients.  Yes, it's fun inside, couches, brew equipment, and sports on tv, but yes, soccer, and Marin style sports.    Anyways, I had a great spinach, feta, and dried tomato, and a delicious IPA. 

Rome, Italy

We arrived in Rome getting on pretty late.  Still Luca picked us up at the airport, (in the airport no less) and brought us to our hotel, then to this little plaza area for dinner.  Finding it and a parking spot were a significant part of the adventure, but Luca seemed un-phased the entire time, and determined to get us to this place.  It was rustic and the buildings and surroundings seemed a little tired, but many people were streaming in, and having a good time, which is contagious. 

What seemed like in the middle of the street and plaza were a number of these nice little ristorantes.

We ended up at Elettra, with traditional Italian cuisine.  The food, including my fish was delicious, and the salad with crispy onions, also delicious.  The pictures don't capture the fun-ness of the place.  Casual, yet elegant.  Not too expensive, yet so tasty.  Great waiter (I think), Luca talked with him in Italian.  Anyway, I felt a bit local here.  Really liked it.  Luca, thanks for such warm hospitality.

Where am I?

It's been here for sometime.  Maybe older than some of you.  It's got global relevance.  There's current and historical reference.  Okay, I'm not doing very well on the guessing game.  Look at the building on the left.  Can you see the logo on the top?  These tents are made from plates, together they appear to be flowing.  The tower is multi-functional.  Part restaurant, part communications tower.  It's the site of the XX summer Olympiad.  Remember Mark Spitz? Seven gold metals?  Olga Korbut and gymnastics?  Not to mention the unmentionable massacre of the Israel team members?

This is a view from the communications tower.  We ended up having dinner here.  Below you can see the BMW headquarters building and the edge of the BMW museum.

For BMW fans, here's the whole shooting match.  lower left huge building is the new gorgeous BMW museum.   We had no time to visit, but it looks fantastic, and huge.  Behind it, is part of the BMW factory.  Mid right is the BMW headquarters building.  It's called something like the quad tower or something.  Off in the distance, top center is the sports arena, in glowing red and almost looks like it's floating.  The color changes every couple minutes.  Our dining experience rotates.  I think we made 2 or so revolutions. 

I liked this divider light wall, made of wire and lighting embedded in the restaurant.

Of particular interest to me is the Olympic pool, from 1972.  The Germans take pride in the facility and the event altogether.  It was exciting to visit, and swim here.  I actually swam in lane 4, as did Mark Spitz, for a number of his amazing metal flurry.

What does this say?  This is the Spitz lane.

Aerial view of the pool and aquatic area.

Artistic view of the dive pool.  In the background is the 50 meter pool.

This is the official symbol for the XX Olympics.  It's actually a flat weaving, but somehow the photo created this 3D view.  It did not look this way directly.

Our hotel is just across the way from the Olympic center.  This shows a tiny view of some architecture, everywhere around us.

I vaguely remember these concrete dorms, and vividly remember the tiered dorms in the background from the Olympics.  They continuously showed these during the hostage crisis.

So, did you guess?  Yes!  It's Munich.

Jib Jab with Tim
As much as we were on the edge of Munich in this location, we did get a good flavor of some highlights in our short visit.  We actually had two really good meals.  One, a traditional Bavarian meal just on the edge of Munich in a neighborhood area.  The other meal was in the communications tower, and the food was actually quite good!  Who would have thought?!  I really enjoyed our German visit.

I just finished my expense report and found the receipt for an awesome place we ate the first night, called Osterwaldgarten.  It's a great regional beer garden with a very local feel and delicious food.  We had the ox, which was a delicious steak.   We meandered around this area, about 4 stops on the metro from our Olympic village hotel, and only found pizza and beer places.  Finally we stopped a local heading into his apartment, and he pointed us to this place for a local Bavarian favorite.

Here's a photo of the awesome fare.  This is delicious ox, and of course some nice root vegetables.  The steak is on a bed of a noodle type thing, with the crispy delicious onions on top, and the stellar juice/gravy/goodness underneath.  I asked if they had a veggie side, and that's where the wok-cooked bell peppers come in, on the left...kind of the Californian adaptation as it were.  The beer, of course, was delicious, and a highlight here.  Yes, it's a beer garden, but it was way cold and late to be eating outside while we were there.

I wish one of these was my mug.

 It's a fun, Bavarian place inside.

Yes, I'm pretty obnoxious, always taking pictures with the camera.  I wanted a working picture, but didn't want to interrupt, so this is not necessarily an ideal candid moment.  None-the-less, here we are, looking professional.  This is Joerg and Mark, ready to head into our meeting.  As you can see, it turned out to be a nice day in Munich.

Amalfi Coast, Italy

We had a meeting in Pagoni, not far from Naples, and I noticed a sign for the Amalfi Coast.  It's over a range, quite steep hills and narrow roads with tight turns.  In some places, not room for two cars, in fact there were a couple spots where we had a car face-off, and had to back up to let the opposite traffic through.  Another interesting diversion was this goat herder and his flock.  See his herder dog behind the truck?  Totally awesome.

 There was a lot of cloud cover, so the views were a little interrupted, but here's an idea of the rugged, steep hillside, and the coast below, with an olive tree to border.  The olives, and lemons from this area are renowned, well at least the lemons, which are a special variety.

A blurry picture out the car window, showing the steep hillside.  This is characteristic of the houses and terracing around.

Water view from the road.

Gotta love these guys waiting for something.

Here's the beach view from the center of town.

And looking the other direction, here's my travel partner, Mark.

Here is the cathedral in the town of Amalfi, Saint Andrews.  I'm not sure about that much about it, other than it's beautiful, and they were holding Monday afternoon mass just as we visited.  The bells were ringing and so on.  Quite moving.  Apparently it was first built in the 9th century during the medieval times.  Since then, it's been added onto a couple times over the centuries.

Inside St. Andrews Cathedral.

Mark and Luca talking shop.

As we were leaving the church bells started ringing.  Incredible sound adding to the ambiance.  Take a listen and look.

This is the limoncello made from lemons exclusively from the Amalfi coast.  Not much of a picture, but it's the place we purchased.  Super nice shop and people.  The aroma is pungent with lemon, more than limoncello I've had elsewhere.

As night was setting in, and we were driving along the coast, I saw this place, seemingly dangling over an incredibly high cliff.

On the way out of the area, near, or in Positano, Luca, our incredible tour guide and now friend, had a locally famous pizza place in mind.  I did not catch the name, but awesome pizza, served ever so personally by two waiters, all 100 cm of hand-made deliciousness.

Jib Jab

Here's my two traveling buddies to the Amalfi coast.  Luca is the sales exec who invited us to meet with his account outside Naples.  We finished the 2.5 hour drive from Rome to here, and 5 hours of meetings with the customer, and I noticed a sign to Amalfi.  Luca seemed to pick up on it, or had it in mind all along, I'm still not sure which.  Either way, he took us over the range, shown behind us here, to the goat herders, and beyond.  It turned into about a 19 hour day, which sounds either grueling and terrible, or incredibly awesome and a day to remember for a long time.  Last night, Kirsty and I enjoyed our delicious and special Limoncello, and I remembered our fantastic experience again.  Thanks guys, for going for it and taking me with!