Teacup Lake

So Jana and Suzanne have been waging a campaign to show us everything wonderful about the Portland area, and for Saturday’s effort, they took us cross-country skiing at Teacup Lake on Mount Hood. Unfortunately we slept a little late (this is a habit in Portland) and then took a little long getting out the door what with all the gear collecting that needed doing, so we didn’t end up at the trails until pretty late in the afternoon.

Neither Steve or I have ever done this type of skiing before so it was a little awkward at first, but it’s pretty intuitive and we felt natural before long. I kept my skis in the little tracks that are groomed into the path, which made for care-free swooshing through the woods until Suzanne caught up on the downhill and threatened to run me over.

Steve and Jana forged their own tracks, and then made us climb a hill called ‘the screamer’ which didn’t turn out to be too tough despite the black level warning on the sign. We could see Mount Hood in the distance, draped with strings of lights illuminating the downhill slopes for night skiing.

By the time we made it back to Portland we were all starving. We tried to get some quick dinner at Portland’s famous food carts, but they were all closed for the winter so we ended up at a brew pub (surprise!) where we devoured rather a lot of grub. We finished the evening back at Dan’s for a little more Rock Band II, which was a relief since Steve has been asking to go back and play the drums again all week!

Suzanne has been hosting us like a champ since we arrived, despite the fact that she was in a car accident a few days earlier (in which her car was declared a total loss), and her little dog Mr. Right is not quite as Right as he used to be when he was younger (and therefore requires some extra care). We wanted to help her out so on Sunday we spent the day car shopping for a replacement for her black Honda Fit. We ended the day with…a silver Honda Fit! Steve tried to sell Suzanne on the idea of getting something else, but by the end of the day not only did she get what she wanted all along, but Steve said he’d be interested in getting one too one day.

For our final Portland dinner, we converged with Jana, Dan, and other friends for Ethiopian food. The plates are served family style with a special sour grain pancake that you tear off into pieces with which to scoop up spicy meat and veggies. Extremely delicious! We stayed up late with Suzanne, and headed south this morning for Christmas with the fam’ in Ashland…