Category: Photos
Oregon Gone Wild – Columbia River Gorge
So I finally made the trip to Portland, OR to visit Adam and meet his wife Stacey. I flew in Thursday night. Stacey was flying home to visit her family for the weekend and Adam was able to drop her off and pick me up.
Adam and I went back to their condo to drop my stuff. He has a great place in downtown Portland. We spent the first evening walking around his neighborhood. It has just about everything you could ask for and a nice vibe to boot. Eventually we stopped at the Blue Moon Tavern which is a McMenamins. We only went to a couple of them and the Blue Moon was sort of low key compared to the other one we went to (more on that later). We sat outside … Read More »
T-2
Time to see if I really got what it takes – what it takes to jump out of an airplane for a second time. Kenny had been saying throughout the winter that he thought he would like to try sky diving too. So every time we got together the topic came up, and always ended with Harry and I trying to talk any one we could into going, and us promising Kenny we’d go with him once spring rolled around.
Harry did his homework. He went to The Ranch and bought a couple of books about the certification process. He went and observed jumpers to identify the best Jump Masters (JM) to go through the licensing process with. Then on a whim he stopped at The Ranch on his way back from a job one day … Read More »
Squeaver Country
Recently Ali and I met up with Gabe and Jana for an extended weekend of relaxation. Gabe sold the trip as being at a cabin in the North Georgia Mountains. We pictured it as rustic, secluded, and sparse. After they picked us up from the airport we headed East down I-20. It turns out the cabin, lovingly named Old Sandwich, was located at Cuscowilla on Lake Oconee in Eastern Georgia – a golf resort. Not quite what we expected, but the place rocked. It had two bedrooms plus a master suite each with a private bath. The living room and master suite had a fireplace. There was a full service kitchen. The back deck looked out at the green on hole #2. In a word, gorgeous.
It was my kind of … Read More »
Mont Tremblant
Since I started skiing back at the turn of the century, Ali and I have tried to do one major trip a year. This year we chose to go to Mont Tremblant in the Quebec Province of Canada. Several years ago I did some work with Ciena. The division I worked with was based out of Kanata in Ontario. John Kerr was the Supporting Engineer. He raved about Mont Tremblant. After Ali investigated, we were pretty excited about going. A couple of years past and I ran into John in a random restaurant in Boston, and his first question to me was, “Have you gone to Tremblant yet?” The answer was, “no,” but I figured since he was still asking about it, it must be a decent place to go.
For our drive up I … Read More »
Learning To Fall
It’s been just over a week since I made that first step. We were at 13,500 feet; I was standing with my toes hanging over the edge of the door; and my feet pointed towards the wing. I had a jump master strapped to my back, and I was ready to take the plunge of my life, or so I thought.
I’ve been talking about going sky diving for a while now. My brother and I were going to do it at one point, but we couldn’t get our schedules to line up. I was talking about it at Kenny and Pat’s house, and I said, “I want to do it, but I don’t want to go by myself.” At that Harry piped up and said, “I’ll go with you.” The conversation ended with assurances we would re-address it come spring … Read More »