Portland Conference Trip - day 1

Hi, all!  Yes, all 3 of you who read this blog! I'm in Portland, OR. Arvid is here for an engineering conference,  and I am here to sleep.  And shop. And perhaps get a manicure. Reading about this trip may be very boring to some of you,  so I will not be offended  if you stop right now.  Otherwise, read on,  my crazy friends.

We left the kids with family this morning,  and hopped a flight to Seattle.   Let me just add this about international flights: unless it's going to be a busy day at the airport,  you really don't need to be there 3 hours early!  We had checked in online last night,  so we had almost nothing to do before customs.  And you're not allowed to go through customs more than 2 hours before your flight.  So we sat in a tiny hallway waiting for about 45 minutes.  After customs (which had no lineup) we sat by the gate for another hour and half before boarding.  3 hours not required today.

Our flight to Seattle went smoothly,  but our connecting flight to Portland was delayed on the tarmac for an hour or so for a mechanical issue.

I love flying, though the older I get, the more uncomfortable the seats get. The pictures below were some of the highlights of the flying part of the day.  We saw Mount Rainier, and Mount Saint Helens from above. It's  crazy to think that Mount Saint Helens is a volcano that has erupted in my lifetime!

The other highlight of the day was the restaurant we found for dinner. The place was called 'Prime Rib + Chocolate Cake'. We walked by it trying to find a particular seafood  place (that seems to have disappeared), and were instantly drawn in by the title.  The food was good, and amazingly quick (*5 minutes after ordering it was on our table* quick). Arvid had good Ginger Ale. My plan is for this to be the only 'Look at my food! ' picture, but I make no promises.

That's  it for today. I haven't  decided what I'll  do tomorrow.  I'm enjoying the unplannedness of this trip.