USA - Portland & Seattle

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We woke up at 5am on Tuesday and took a shuttle bus to the airport. After saying our goodbyes, Ian got his flight home to London and I flew to Phoenix. With an hour wait at Phoenix airport, I then got my flight to Portland. On arrival in Portland, I took the Light Rail for 45 minutes and then walked to my hostel. I spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the shops downtown before getting dinner and returning to my room. After watching a DVD, I had an early night. I was out by 8am on Wednesday walking around Portland along the river and then through Chinatown. Then I caught the Light Rail to Oregon Zoo where I spent a few hours walking around. I saw bears, elephant, giraffe, tigers, eagles and many other birds, hippos, polar bears and different types of monkey. Then I walked around the Vietnam War Memorial before taking the bus to the Japanese Gardens and then the Rose Gardens. After just missing the hourly bus back to the Light Rail station, I decided to take the one hour walk through the forest. On arriving back to downtown, I had lunch and then returned to the hostel for a couple of hours. In the evening, I took the train to the Rose Garden arena to watch Portland play their first home game of the season against Memphis in the NBA. On Thursday morning, I got a taxi to the train station for my 9am departure to Seattle. I arrived in Seattle early afternoon and walked to the Green Tortoise hostel. The rest of the afternoon was spent walking around the city. In the evening, I stayed at the hostel and took advantage of their free internet as well as a huge free dinner buffet. On Friday (after my yummy free breakfast), I spent the day walking around exploring the markets and going to an exhibition on space and science. In the evening, I walked to the Key Center to watch Seattle play Utah in the NBA. On Saturday morning, I got a taxi to the train station and caught my 10am bus to Vancouver.

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