Portland Trip: Days 11-13 – Work

September 2-4, 2014

This is not a work blog. We don’t talk about work here.

I will note that this was my first trip to Portland where I didn’t go downtown to Powell’s City of Books. I did have a couple pints of Ruby at John Barleycorn’s one evening and a nice sturgeon dinner at Five Spice the next.

Thursday evening I hit the road right after work. It took me an hour to get through rush hour traffic and onto I-84. My plan was to get to Richland, WA. I needed to get as far down the road as possible, as the following day I wanted to make it to Rexburg, ID, without spending the day on boring interstate highways.

The drive on I-84 through the Columbia Gorge is quite scenic for an interstate. Earlier in the trip, I went west on the highway on the other side of the river. I think the trip on I-84 is perhaps prettier than that one. As I drove, I kept an eye out for someplace to have dinner. I saw a sign for a brewery in Hood River and got off the highway there. I circled the central business district a couple of times but didn’t see the place and nothing else jumped out and grabbed my attention. I ended up eating at Wendy’s in the Dalles as the sun set. After fueling up I returned to the highway. Now that it was dark, scenery was in short supply. The only notable sight was the John Day dam lit up in red, white, and blue lights. Other drives on this trip ended as darkness fell. Not so today, as I spent two more hours on the road before I stopped at a motel in Kennewick, WA.