Day 7b + 8b : Seattle for the win, now off to Portland and the heat

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Alright, I should be back to doing a daily entry while I'm in Portland... it's somewhat hard to do when I go to Jays games because I'm so tired afterwards lol.

Day 7b - Seattle for the win!

Chihuly Garden and Glass is exquisite - I don't know why I didn't come here last time, it's truly a gem. The way they have it set up and staged is perfect: outdoors in the garden you have the sun helping all the colours in the glass pop and inside all the backgrounds/walls/pedestals are jet black with perfect lighting that creates not only the ideal backdrop for photos, but also provides the most brilliant reflections of the artwork. It's really just amazing that everything is made of this glass. My favourite was probably the boat full of marbles/balls or the room where the ceiling was all glass (and cast colourful shadows on the walls), but everything was gorgeous. I quickly picked some fav shots for here.

Tonight was my last Jays game (boo), but they won again (yay!). I have to say, going .500 on this trip was not at all what I expected! I sat down in the 100s this time, in the outfield like where I used to sit in Toronto. I was right beside this bar area near the bullpens, so if I turned and looked down, I could see our guys warming up (let me tell you Giles throwing 97+ mph, really looks like 97+ mph... balls gets from A-B in a second). It was also hilarious watching some of the Mariners fans try to distract the Jays lol.

I was sitting 2nd row and there was the cutest family in front of me - mom, dad and their little girl... 3 or 4 years old. It was super cute. (I was so happy they got a ball! Teoscar threw them one about half way through the game) Of course most of the section were Jays fans again - since it's Saturday, it's clear that even more Canadians came down for the game - a true sea of blue. O Canada was beautifully sung by thousands of us and the 7th inning rendition of 'Take me out to the ball game' was once again punctuated with a chorus of "root root root for the BLUE JAYSSSSSSS". Estrada pitched a gem of a game (rarity this season), and the standing ovation he got was reminiscent of that playoff game.

Honestly, the atmosphere for all 3 games has been like a playoff game, but this one was next level - it was right up there with any of the playoff games I've been to. West coast fans know how to do it! I do kind of feel bad for the Mariners fans that come to the game... just because of the sheer number of us, we're collectively kind of obnoxious to deal with. 1-on-1 I like to think we aren't... or at least I hope most aren't.

Speaking of obnoxious... there was a streaker near the end of the game and boy did he go for it! He made it farrrrrrrr! He got all the way out to mid center field before being surrounded by 4 guards, none of which looked overly keen to be the one to tackle him. One had a towel and was like trying to lasso him? It was quite the show. I had like second hand embarrassment for how many of the Jays fans were cheering this idiot on.

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Day 8b - Off to Portland!

Took the train to Portland today - I was sad to be walking to the train station which is near the stadium... all these people wearing their Jays jerseys and I'm like oh, goodbye... (they lost today, so I mean, oh well). Amtrak is always amusing to me because you truly never know what you're going to get - will it be on time? will it even show up? will the train function properly? will the wifi work? will you get a window seat through the random seat reservations? will there even be a given seat or will it be a mad dash as everyone tries to get on? So many questions to look forward to!

Thankfully, by Amtrak standards, this was a perfect trip. I joined lines before they were announced (for my seat reservation, and to board) which meant I wasn't stuck in the middle of nowhere of the line that snakes through the entire waiting area lol. I got my window seat - and my seat-mate literally disappeared the second we boarded (more on that in a sec) so I had 2 seats to myself on the fully booked train. Wifi and plugs worked. Left on time, arrived on time (well, ~10-15min late but that's as good as it gets). When I went to get my lunch they actually had good sandwiches AND some guy was coming out of business class, had an extra coupon for $3 off food and gave it to me. Beautiful.

While I was off getting food they had checked tickets, so about 20min after I came back the ticket guy comes in and lists a bunch of names for the people he didn't see tickets for yet. I assumed Deshjerden was me. He asked if the girl beside me was travelling with me - nope! And haven't seen her since we boarded. He came back another few times during the train and she literally never came back so I have no sweet clue where she went haha. Works for me!

Getting to Portland was a sun punch to the face. It is hotttttttt. I'm so used to being nice and comfortable in the low-20s and then cold at night - I get off the train here and it's like 34 degrees lol. I then took the path to the hostel that Google maps suggested... very much took me through what seemed to be the homeless park / they were giving out free meals... this is a recurring theme on this trip - the homelessness seems so much more prevalent than I remembered it last few times in San Fran and Seattle, and it seems to follow the trend here. Or maybe it was just the areas I was in this time. Who knows. Anyway, it was middle of the day, so I felt safe but I'll probably bus back to the train station when I have the early departure later this week.

I didn't really do anything other than check out the grocery store lol and look at what I'm planning for tomorrow. I'm quite torn because I want to hike, but I don't want to melt and/or burn before my friend's wedding, but I figure in the woods you'd be in shade. But also, I'm super feeling my allergies here despite taking my Reactine... so... perhaps hiking through the trees isn't the best idea in the world... but then again they do have redwoods... so we'll see.

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Comments

[Joan]

Jays Tickets
Hey Julie, Just wondering how long ago you had to get your tickets for the stretch in Oakland and then the Seattle games (which sounded so fun). Hope they continue on their roll this week - especially Friday when we are there

[jewel89]

I bought the tickets quite awhile ago (I want to say March or April..?), but I def could have waited - especially for Oakland, there were tons of seats. Seattle games weren't sold out either, but even back then when I looked at seats the sections near the Jays dugout were virtually all gone. I hope they play well back home for you guys too!