Yellowstone Adventures!

I’ve spent a lot of this trip traveling to places I’ve never heard of, on the word of a passing stranger, or in the case of Yellowstone National Park, the general fame of the location. I had, of course, heard of this park, but to be honest, I never really knew what the place was all about. I’m sure most of you are far more learned than I, but for those of you who, like me, always heard it was cool but never knew why, allow me to shed some light.

Yellowstone is the home of Old Faithful, a geyser that, as the name suggests, spews at predictable, regular intervals (every 45 min – 1.5 hours) and has been doing this for forever. Probably not forever, actually, but I don’t feel like looking up when it’s estimated to have started. The entire area comprises the largest volcanic system on the continent, and as such is covered with over 10,000 geothermal features, including 300 geysers and massive amounts of beautiful hot springs. It's also well known for a wide variety of wildlife.

I didn’t find the park itself to be very pretty… in part because of a fire about twenty years ago that the forest is still slowly recovering from, and because we came at the wrong time. I assumed autumn would be beautiful, and apparently it was, but for this national park, winter has arrived. When we started from Boise to Yellowstone, the RV park reservation guy was like, “You’re from Texas? You know it’s supposed to be eight degrees tonight, right?” EIGHT?! No. I did not know that. This would be a good spot to mention that our heater was broken, and there was nobody in Yellowstone available to fix it in the amount of time we were staying there. So, we toughed it out with layers and layers of clothes and blankets, huddled around our little space heater. We have since gotten that fixed. ANYWHO, back to my original point, the park itself is a little dead right now, but the geothermal features definitely made it a fascinating day!

So, pictures! Here are a few geysers. The upper left photo is Old Faithful, which was cool, but hardly the most interesting thing we saw that day. The far left part of the white in the photo is the actual water spewing upward, and the rest of the white part is the accompanying steam. If you look close, you can see a rainbow! The other two are just other geysers in the park that I manage to catch on camera. 

The hot springs, in my opinion, were really the highlight of the park. The colors were just unreal. The photo on the far right is a spring called the Great Prismatic. It’s tough to see in photos, but the steam coming up from the hot spring displayed a beautiful spectrum of color. The surroundings of that one were pretty insane as well.

We didn’t get to see much wildlife this late in the year, but I did see my first bison… and then HERD of bison! Also, again, difficult to tell in the picture, but that raven was about the size of a large cat. And not even remotely wary of people. Wicked.

Oh, a quick word about the Grand Tetons. As I mentioned previously, winter has begun in the park, and we missed all the beautiful fall colors. The day we tried to see the mountains was foggy and overcast, with a layer of clouds covering up the jagged peaks. The lakes and ponds that are usually mirrored were not, and we didn’t see a single of the many varieties of wildlife in the park, which is a major draw to this area. After stopping to take a few unimpressive pictures, we ended up deciding to keep driving.

So, we are now in Fort Collins, Co, which will be followed by Denver, Santa Fe, and finally Austin for Halloween. We are officially on our way home, and I have some serious mixed feelings about it. I can’t believe how quickly this year has gone, and I don’t want it to be over! At the same time… well, you know how when you have to pee, and then you actually SEE the restroom, you have to pee so much worse? That’s how I feel. Now that we’re this close, even though I’m sad that our out-of-state travels are ending for this year, I can’t wait to see my friends!!

Yellowstone + Detox

Sam and I are heading to Yellowstone National Park/Grand Tetons today for about a week and a half, and have decided to use our isolation in the forest as the perfect opportunity for a physical and mental spring cleaning. Or… fall cleaning, if you will.

It started out as a decision to do a liver cleanse. I know there’s a lot of controversy on the subject, but we’re not taking any cleanse supplements, just committing to 11 days of pure, clean living after destroying our livers with delicious beer all year. Our livers, and bodies in general, are extremely resilient, but sometimes it’s a good idea to give your body a break from toxins and foods that are difficult to process in order to let it naturally revive itself. We’re mostly going to be following the detox outlined in The Fast Track Detox Diet, by Ann Louis Gittleman. The diet itself, along with a bit of additional information, can be found here: http://experiencelife.com/article/fast-track-liver-detox/ for free.

Phase 1: Seven Day Prequel

The idea behind this is that before you detox, it’s a good idea to strengthen your liver and colon to get ready for the job ahead. It’s really not that much different than the way we normally eat, but starting tomorrow, we’ll be adding specific “Liver-Loving” fruits and veggies to our diet, as well as an emphasis on getting enough water, and adding a blue-green algae or spirulina for a week. We’ll also be avoiding excess fat, any type of sugar or artificial sweetener, refined carbs, GLUTEN (ack!), soy, and of course, alcohol and caffeine.

Phase 2: One Day Juice Fast

With our livers and colons in tip-top shape, we will advance to the juice fast. I, for one, am a huge fan of juice fasts. Last year, my bestie came and stayed with me while we experimented with my new juicer on a three-day juice fast. The first day was kind of awful, but I felt increasingly more alert and vibrant and by the end of it, I wasn’t sure why I ever ate real food at all! I wouldn’t recommend it for more than three days, and next time, I might even supplement all those vitamins with some almond protein, but I was hooked! That being said, I no longer have my juicer, so this will be way less fun. But hopefully productive.

Phase 3: Three Day Sequel

The Fast Track plan is basically to follow the guidelines from the first week, adding in probiotics and hydrochloric acid in order to help remove the toxins that were released during the juice fast. With the exception of yogurt or kefir for probiotic purposes, I will be following the Fast Track, but I plan to abstain from processed foods and animal proteins as well. And most importantly, NO ALCOHOL!

In addition to the diet, I’m committing to 11 days of yoga, which I have almost completely gotten away from. Many yoga moves, particularly twists, are already touted to remove toxins from the muscles, so it seems a match made in heaven with a detox diet. If there’s any way I can find a sauna in that time, that will happen as well.

Not entirely removed from yoga is the mental and emotional cleansing. I read a book earlier this year called the Power of Now that completely changed my life. It details out everything I believe about life and God and the most effective way to plug into the Source. I strongly believe that you have to be in the right place to appreciate that book. I gave it to Sam months ago, and he finally started reading it, and I can already see it changing his life as well! I’m really excited about what I foresee as a new chapter in our relationship, where we hopefully can get to a place of holding each other accountable for staying in the present, and staying connected to the Beloved and each other. I decided to re-read the book as well, and I’m anticipating our little retreat involving a lot of reading of truth, meditating and spiritually growing, individually and as a couple.

Here’s to Fall Cleaning! And lots of pictures in Yellowstone!

About a Bike

One of Sam and I’s goals for this trip was to get comfortable biking, both the mountain and road varieties. I left Texas with a bike that my best friend gave me, and Sam had yet to purchase one. In Santa Fe, roughly six months ago, he ended up buying an insanely awesome mountain bike from a friend, and still we have yet to really ride them.

We store the bikes on the back of the car, because, well, we don’t exactly have anywhere else to put them. While attending a relaxing yoga class in Portland, I come out to find that someone has cut right through my bike lock and the bike is long gone. They couldn’t get through Sam’s bike lock, and out of spite, they cut his shifter cables and brake lines, which were hydraulic, and stole his derailer, the $120 part that moves the chain between gears. Disheartened, we took it to a friend’s bike shop, who was completely enamored by Sam’s bike, and even offered to trade his used $4k mountain bike for Sam’s injured one. Sam, sensing he had a pretty awesome piece of equipment on his hands, opted to go ahead and pay the guy to fix his own. As we were telling him what happened, he told us he had a cheap bike that someone had traded him for parts, and with a bit of fixing up, he’d sell it to me for $75, an opportunity I promptly jumped at!

So, after seven months on the road, and the end of biking season approaching, we’re finally starting to give it a try. I just spent more than the bike on a helmet, lock, headlight and little LED lights for the wheels that make glowing wheel circles in the dark! I took it out for our (the bike and I’s) very first spin, a road trip from the campground we were staying at outside of Bend into town, about seven miles. Slightly hilly, country roads with almost no traffic… it was so serene and beautiful! It definitely proved to me, once again, how out of shape I am, and my butt hurt for days afterwards. Yesterday, I biked from our campground into Boise for dinner, probably about six miles, and it’s starting to feel normal! Just in time for it to be too cold to ride!

Physical Challenge: Rock Climbing and the Trail of Ten Falls

Sam and I have decided to start something we’re calling Physical Challenges. Yes, inspired by Double Dare, but with significantly less slime! The idea is that once at least once a week, every Saturday (or Friday, or Sunday, as appropriate), we’ll set out to do something active and outside of our comfort zone, in one way or another.

For our first Physical Challenge, we signed up for Friday Night Heights at the Portland Rock Gym for three hours of beginner-level instruction and climbing. Sam has outdoor climbing experience, with free-climbing up rocks over water, followed by jumping into said water. I had zero experience. We were in a group of about eight people, and we basically just took turns climbing various courses at the instruction of our trainer, who after the first few climbs would customize each climb to the individual. Sam did awesome right away, and was quickly moved up to climbing more difficult courses. He was a regular Spiderman! It took me a few tries to make it to the top… as it turns out, I’m a bit afraid of heights, even though there’s no actual danger of falling. But wow, what a rush! We will definitely be doing that again! 

Our second Physical Challenge was to hike the Trail of Ten Falls in Silver Lake State Park. It wasn’t particularly difficult, but at 8.7 miles, so it ended up being a good four hour hike. We only saw nine of the waterfalls, and two weren't really worth taking photos of, due to the lack of rain during the summer season, but we have pictures of 7/10. 

My third Physical Challenge, which I unfortunately had to do without Sam, was my first crack at horseback riding! I signed up for a two-hour private session that included a 30-min. lesson and an hour and a half trail ride. Turns out, it wasn’t all that physically difficult, just more of a process to learn how to get the horse to do what you want. Mine was a little stubborn. Once on the trails, though, it was so peaceful and fun! We did some trotting, and got to go through a little river and all through a beautiful forest. We’re almost to the end of horse-riding season, but I’m hoping to get another chance for a trail ride before then.

For a quick locational update, we just arrived in Boise, ID last night, where one of Sam’s offices is. Hopefully, we’ll get to spend some time hanging out with his colleagues for a couple of days, and then on to Yellowstone National Park!

Portland Music and Food

Music

I’ve waited so long to write about Portland, that I had to skip over some pretty major things, the main one being MusicFest NW! Our good friend Mike flew out for the weekend portion of a five day music festival spread out across the city, similar to SXSW. I hadn’t heard of most of the bands, but managed to find ones ahead of time that I thought I might like, and I wasn’t disappointed! I got to sample a wide variety of Portland music venues, which I otherwise would not have gotten to do. Crystal Ballroom is totally cool – it’s upstairs, and has a wooden, spring-loaded dance floor. There’s a balcony with tons of extra seating, as well as an additional bar with tables. I got to see Passion Pit there, who were so much fun! We saw several shows at the Pioneer Courthouse Square in the middle of downtown, which they transformed into a music venue for the weekend. It was much more corporate than I would have liked, but I got to see Gardens and Villa, Menomena, Beirut and Silversun Pickups there! Hawthorne Theater was very Trees-ish, for those reading from Dallas. We rocked out to some Against Me! and had a total blast! We tried to catch a show at Doug Fir, and ended up having a terrible, terrible experience and I will likely not be back. Before that, however, we got to hear a guy named Kishi Bashi who was a seriously insane violin player. Look him up. A few weeks later, we saw Father John Misty at the Wonder Ballroom, who I am now in love with.

The last one I want to talk about was just crazy. Sam got us tickets to go see Random Rab and Govinda at a venue called Refuge. Now, I’m not a huge fan of electronic music, but these guys make the kind that I really like. The kind that has belly dancers! This venue was ridiculous, though… the whole thing was like a mini festival. There was the main room with the music and the dancing, and an aerial silk that people played on! Then, there was more of a chill room, with couches and slightly quieter music. The lobby and the patio were all set up for vendor booths selling clothes and jewelry and art. It was yet another of these love-filled bonding experiences with a ton of random strangers. I can’t believe they just have a place like that!

Eateries

For brunch, we had great experiences on Alberta St. at Fuel Café and Pine State Biscuits, which is a legitimate South Carolina southern eatery. These biscuits are for real, y’all. Sam got a biscuit sandwich with fried chicken and sausage gravy, and my egg, cheese and mushroom gravy biscuit sandwich was to die for! And then, there was Blossoming Lotus. Mmm. Higher-end vegetarian restaurant, where I had something called live nachos that were these homemade “chips” made from walnuts, zucchini-tahini nacho “cheese,” ground pecan chorizo, topped with your standard nacho veggies, cashew sour cream and avocado dressing. I was freaking out, it was so good. Wow. Our other favorite by far was a Lebanese place downtown called Karam that was possibly the best I’ve ever had. At least comparable to Ali Baba in Dallas, maybe better. Salt and Straw is the most ridiculous ice cream shop I have ever been to! Seriously, Amy’s has nothing on this place. This is a gourmet ice cream shop, with flavors such as Honey Balsamic Strawberry with Cracked Pepper (Heaven on earth, I’m telling you!), Pear with Blue Cheese, and a seasonal called Feast’s Oregon Bounty, which consisted of salted chocolate ice cream with whiskey-candied hazelnuts and a cheese buttercream ribbon. Ice cream perfection. We spent our last day in town working and snacking at Ford Food + Drinks, an adorable coffee shop with perfect paninis, delectable coffee, and a seemingly endless supply of electrical outlets!

Bars That May or May Not Also Have Awesome Food

If I had to pick one go-to hangout in Portland, it would be the Bye and Bye. Great cocktail menu, great beer selection, and late night vegan food! We had a vegan “meatball” sub sandwich that was delicious! Over and Out was another fun place… we were looking for a sports bar for some football watching, and came across this place. Large, high-def TVs, a pool table, but playing indie music and amazing food! Nothing like your traditional sports bar. Secret Society was a small cocktail bar with a heck of a Tom Collins and possibly the best tuna melt I have ever had. No canned tuna here! The Hilt on Alberta was very cool, too… we needed a late afternoon spot for some snacks and wifi, and ended up here. They make a ton of liquor infusions, and some great hummus and falafel. Green Dragon Bistro is, apparently, also a brewery, but I didn’t realize that when I visited, because they also have an amazing beer selection. They get special note here because they carry La Chouffe, a beer that Sam and I fell in love with in Amsterdam, and are rarely able to find! Bailey’s Taproom is the last one I’ll mention – they boasted a daily rotating, high-end beer selection. Enough said. :)

Some Breweries in Portland

I usually try to only mention my favorite places in these blogs, but for my own reference later, I want to talk about all of the breweries I went to. Discussing breweries is always a difficult thing, because whether or not you like the brews depends on what kind of beer you like. As such, I try to talk more about ambiance, service and food. With that said, it’s difficult not to pick favorites based on the beer that I like. Sam and I’s beer taste has been drifting closer and closer together, to the point that we really seek out most of the same things now. Rich, super malty, full flavor beers with minimal hops and high alcohol content. Specifically, Scotch ales, amber ales, browns, reds, black IPAs, strong ales, Belgian quadrupels. You get the idea.

Another thing I want to mention is Fresh Hops season. Most of the hops used in the US is grown up here in the Northwest. They just finished the hops harvest, and while the vast majority of beers are brewed with dry hops, all the breweries in the area lined up for their share of the fresh variety. This means most of the local breweries are now featuring at least one fresh hopped beer, which tastes much more… well… fresh! They’re so good!

So, on to the breweries. As much as I hate to admit it, Deschutes was probably my favorite in Portland. The brewery is also a restaurant, which we had a good experience with, and they had the most of my favorite types of beers, all unique and outstanding. My favorites were the Dissident, a dark, sour beer, the Strong Man NWPA, Fresh Hop Stock Ale, Fresh Hop NW Brown, and my super favorite, their new Jubilale! Hair of the Dog Brewery and Tasting Room was also something special. Really cool little spot, with some very unique, strong beers, all named after various people’s dogs. My favorites were Greg, an organic pilsner made with winter squash (what?!), Fred, a Golden Strong Ale, and their seasonal beer, Otto, which was similar to a barley wine. Oh, man! I suppose I will mention Rogue Ales here. The first time I went, I was blown away by a brew called the Hazelnut Brown and their amber, as well as the service and the bar itself. We went back a few weeks later to get a growler filled for the road, and experienced possibly the worst service I’ve ever encountered at a bar. I don’t want to go into details, but I’m now torn about my opinion of this place. If they didn’t have my favorite beer ever, I would never go back. But that Hazelnut Brown is insanely delicious! So… take that as you will. Cascade Brewing Barrel House is a popular one in Portland, which specializes in sour beers. If you’re not familiar with sours, it’s pretty much what it sounds like. You know right away what your relationship will be with this type of beer. I don’t love all of them, but they have one called the Old Bruin that is fantastic! Some of them taste like Lucas. Taster trays are a good idea here. They also have a huge patio, and yummy beet salad and beer soup! Amnesia Brewing was the kind of place I can see myself hanging out at. Good arts, good music, friendly bartender and all around delicious beers.

Coalition had a really cool, small brew vibe to it, and a couple of decent beers. The Wu Cream Ale was actually really good, and the Maple Porter was ridiculous! BridgePort Brewery and Brewpub was a cool spot – really large with a full restaurant and big TVs for the watching of sports. They had some really good seasonals, of which I do not remember the names. One was spiced just like a pumpkin ale, but without the pumpkin. Delish! The Hop Czar Imperial IPA was notable as well. Tugboat Brewery, where a friend of ours works, has some really great beers as well, and a nice, kind of woody dive bar feel to it. They have a rotating cask ale, which is always a plus! The Commons Brewery was an awesome little spot where you try tasters on giant barrels (used as tables) in their actual brew house, and they’re only open a few hours a week. The super friendly owner was bartending, and so happy to talk to us. It was exactly what I was expecting and did not receive from Upright (review below). Their beers were not my favorite style, but the brewery itself is worth checking out. 

Just a few I want to mention (again, mostly for my own reference) that I was not a huge fan of. We experienced some pretty terrible service at Sasquatch Brewery, and because of that, combined with a list of mediocre beers, I won’t be back. Migration Brewing was not particularly our scene… kind of a loud, sports bar-ish place. The beers were alright, particularly the amber ale. I probably won’t go back there. Upright Brewing had the potential to be super cool. There’s one big table in the middle of their actual brewing room, and they’re only open for a few hours on the weekend for tastings. The place is kind of difficult to find, and you have to go into an otherwise unoccupied building, find the elevator, and take it to the basement brewery. This was a source of some negative Yelp reviews, but I thought it was super sneaky and awesome! We get there, and nobody greets us… we have to kind of figure out where the beer is being served, and the guy serving it acted like we were inconveniencing him by wanting to pay for some tastings. There’s a guy playing a guitar, and any time the patrons started talking, he would stop playing and wait for us to stop. We told him we were really enjoying the background music, and he said, “Maybe when I’m 75, I’ll be ok playing background music, but not now.” He was in his 60s, and ended up not playing anymore because the people in the room continued conversing. It was completely inappropriate. They specialize in saisons, a type of rustic, farmhouse Belgian beer, and they all tasted pretty much the same to me, except Six and a brown that they had. Overall, I was pretty let down.

And there you have it. Twelve out of the 40-something breweries in Portland!

I Love Portland!

Everyone always said I would love Portland, but I never knew exactly why, or to what extent. For those who know me well, you know how much I love San Francisco. I always assumed when we decided to call it a trip and pick a place to live, it would be there. However, after three weeks (and counting) in Portland, it seems all too clear to both Sam and I that this is where we belong. Where to start...

Portland is laid out in four… ahem, FIVE quadrants. What’s interesting is that in Seattle, I looked up where the cool neighborhood was (Capitol Hill), and that’s mostly where we hung out. In Portland, I just looked up cool places – restaurants, bars, parks, etc. – and slowly discovered that we were most in love with the southeast. Upon discussing this with our new friends, we found out that yes, of course, the southeast is the best. What’s odd about that is that it isn’t downtown. I desperately want to live in a loft, but all of the lofts are in the Pearl district, which for those reading in Dallas, is like Uptown. I’m definitely a city girl, but the coolest parts of Portland are the NE and SE neighborhoods. Actually, to be honest, I haven’t found an area that isn’t cool. It’s almost an entire city of relatively professional young people, and every street, whether it’s particularly cool or not, has at least one awesome restaurant or coffee shop or bar or vintage store or something. Not just in a couple neighborhoods, IN THE WHOLE CITY. I have yet to find a ghetto, only awesomeness!

The skyline here, at night, looks less like a cluster of buildings, and more like a skyline of trees littered with the tiny lights of the city. There is a city park about every four blocks. Which means wherever you live, there are three or four parks within easy walking distance, and most of them are completely awesome! I spent the other day reading near an almost secluded duck pond in the middle of the city. We went hiking last weekend in a forest that was maybe 15 minutes outside of town. The nature here is just incredible.

The food situation is fantastic as well. SO MANY VEGETARIAN RESTAURANTS! And the ones that aren’t veg have plenty of options that are. The food here is so good, but it’s all mostly affordable, rather than just amazing fine dining (although they do have as that well). Whatever kind of food you want in whatever price range, you will not be disappointed! They have an enormous farmers market every Saturday, as well as a smaller one somewhere in the city every day. You can easily buy eggs laid or blackberries picked just the day before, any day of the week! There are also plenty of community gardens, not to mention most people having back yards, so growing you're own food is a legitimate option as well. Everybody truly cares about local, organic, sustainable food, and it's so easy to find!

Getting around town is a breeze as well. We haven’t actually tried the public transportation, because we’re staying about ten minutes north of the city, and the parking situation is so fantastic we haven’t had to use it. It’s all parallel parking, but it’s always easy to find, and we rarely have to pay. The city is also completely bike friendly, with bike lanes on most streets, and a car population that is sensitive to the massive quantities of bike patrons. When we move here, between the public system and our bikes, getting around will just not be a problem.

The other most exciting thing is how they deal with their trash in Portland. Anytime you want to throw something away, you’re confronted with a decision: compost, recycle or trash. And let me tell you, whatever you’re disposing of is almost never “trash,” given the alternatives. The entire city is set up for composting and recycling, and it’s kind of expected that you’re going to participate. I’ve talked to several people that never knew that it’s not that way everywhere. You don’t even have to care about the environment – just put your trash in the right bin. The other day I saw a solar-paneled trash compactor on the street, so they don’t have to use as many man hours collecting trash. That is what I’m talking about!

Besides all these things that are super amazing about Portland, from a more personal perspective, this is where our friends are. We’ve made lots of friends in our travels, but not like this. It feels like everyone around us is super friendly, and wants to talk and meet us and stay friends. We’ve made so many friends here that we continue to see on a regular basis. In three weeks, it already feels like we have a life here, and I’m not going to lie, I really, REALLY don’t want to leave! We’ve pretty much decided that this is where we’ll live next, and all of you will have a place to stay if you ever want to visit Portland!

We’ve been here about three and a half weeks, which is almost twice as long as anywhere else, so believe you me there will be some review blogs ahead!