Places Visited: Oregon

I just crossed the border in to Washington state and my first impression upon pulling in for a coffee is that they have that god-damned-stupid sales tax here. It's so stupid! Coffee for $2.50? Sure, that'll be $2.71. Come on people, it's not too hard to include the tax in the price.
Anyway, that rant is out of the way for the moment. There was no such foolishness down in Oregon, I had such a great time down there where I spend most of my time in Portland. I love that city! I'm open to propositions of marriage that would allow me to move there....
Many thinks must go to my most gracious and generous host, Jill. She took in a stranger on the weekend of the 4th when she already had a visitor staying and showed me such a great time. Thanks Jill, you're a doll.



As always the photos are over in flicker

Places Visited #1: Melbourne

"The story goes like this:
I got in to Melbourne on Thursday morning and went to see a mate at her bike shop [Pony Bikes]. At some point it is mentioned that there is a DC/PK Ripper bike launch party happening that night. I headed off to see some other friends before going back across town to drop in on the party. It was bike porn central! So many niiiice bikes [a few riders took my eye too], and after we tired of the black glasses and tight jeans crowd we retired to a nearby pub for pizza and beers.
The time came to head off, as I had an early flight, so we headed back to the bike shop to pick up my gear, this is the point where it went wrong. Instead of following my instinct and heading straight to the bus station to go to the airport, I took up the offer of a couch for a couple of hours of much needed sleep. I set my alarm with plenty of contingency time, placed the phone right next to my pillow and closed my eyes.
I woke to the concerned face of Sasha leaning over me, telling me I'd missed my flight. That's a sinking feeling of such depth I doubt I'll forget it any time soon.
A tense 2 hours passed between talking to the after-hours desk and waiting for the airline/travel agent to open to find out exactly how far up the creek I was. After a series of calls, emails and more hours with nothing but waiting to do, I now have it under control again and I will be on the same Friday morning flight next week. My wallet is about $500 lighter and I'm a week down in my time in the US, but life goes on and there are even a couple of bonus points to come out of it [repack slightly, bike modification opportunities, see people I missed before departure MKI, tie up loose ends etc].
Lessons learnt from this:
Trust my instinct: I am always paranoid about making the trip to a flight with plenty of time and back up plans, i was thinking this but took up the couch.
The body needs sleep: After 3 nights of sleep totalling 6 hours, sleep will eventually win.
See you sooner or later.
Dan"

That was essentially the email I sent to people I needed to tell I would be a little late arriving. Since then I've been back in Adelaide tying up some loose ends and whatnot, all very anticlimactic and really looking forward to getting under-way again.


If you're in Melbourne and need a trim, go see Bert on Little Collins st. It was the first time I can recall enjoying the experience of getting a hair cut.


Here and now is not the time to get into a discussion about the abuse of the word 'actually'. I'll leave it for now but just putting it out there.