Medford to Portland

Medford is a hard town to describe. Clean and potentially growing but with a lot of vacancies on Main street. 230 miles worth of Craig's list ride landed me in Salem and I'm that much closer to Portland. Nice ride by a nice young lady who was visiting family for the Fourth and the Oregon Country Fair.

Much of my trip so far has revolved around generous amounts of food and some very good beer. After dinner I rode out to a farm house where I offered the owner a couple bucks to camp in their yard. Some nice conversation and then riding in the morning to Aurora along a country road.

Aurora offered nice folks and a few nice shops that some entrepreneurs have made the best of. An antique shop that I viewed for at least a couple of hours had the most amazing collection of building materials known on the planet. If I would have only had a truck I would have gone broke buying things for my house that I need to build.

Stopping in a pub in Oregon city I was well fed with some Scottish delicacies. A deep fried egg that was surrounded by sausage and then deep fried to perfection was a late lunch and fuel to get to Ted's house in Portland. Here I'm looking at train tickets North and checking out the local culture. He is refurbishing a late 1800's 3100 square foot home that will soon be a fine specimen of remodeled urban dwelling. I might just stay for the Fourth of July festivities here or travel North to get more bike touring in before the wedding. Another 50 miles total and only getting moderately lost in the city.

.: Fast forward and here is a short story of Independence Day in Portland :.

Beginning with a brilliant tour of the city by my host Ted, we cross town and hit the University, Downtown, Food-Cart-Pod, Blues Festival, Waterfront, across the "bridge" to another Food-Cart-Pod for a great dinner.  Shrimp Po-Boy for any of you who know the delicacy that this sandwich is.

Quick bike ride to a park where about 100 people have gathered to play dodge ball and throw fireworks at each other.  Then some leader announces the beginning of the ride.  We all ride to the corner store and all 100 people individually buy themselves a Pabst Blue Ribbon (taking roughly half an hour and buying the store out of the malty beverage).  Then they light some more fireworks and head for the waterfront to witness the city fireworks display.  After a good hour of festive explosions and patriotic singing most of the crowd biked down a river path to listen to 80's music and set off more fireworks.  (good times and thanks Ted)