It's all in how you look at it.

Big Pink and a parking lot sign. The sign is on the southeast corner of SW Broadway and West Burnside. Big Pink is exactly one block east of the sign. I used the tilt feature of my camera so that I could take a satisfactory look from this unusual angle. I've cropped the photo and used the HDR-ish special effect at Picnik. By the way, Big Pink is either 536 or 546 feet tall and is the second tallest building in Portland. I found both heights on the Internet, so who knows. I do know I've been on the 30th floor, which is not the top floor, to the Portland City Grill. See views from the PCG here and here.

A few more views from on high

August 23, the afternoon found Milton, Kay and me in downtown Portland on the 30th floor of the Big Pink, at the Portland City Grill. After a snack and a drink, I stood up and walked from the bar to the dining room to take a few more photos.


Looking northeast across the Willamette River. The rust-colored bridge is the Broadway Bridge. The sweeping arched bridge is the Fremont Bridge. And in the foreground is the magnificent Union Station which is undergoing some sort of work on its exterior. I altered the photo in Picnik with the exposure and the sharpness tools.


Looking more north than east across the Pearl in the forefront and a sort of light industrial area that brackets the train tracks as the head north out of downtown Portland, not far from the river. See there in the distance where the hills meet the river? Two dark, upright shapes? Just to the left of the leftmost one, there's a dimmer upright shape. And between the two dark, upright shapes there is a dim shape that goes from the dimmer upright shape on to in between the two dark, upright shapes and parallel with the surface of the river. OK. The two dark, upright shapes are part of the Burlington Northern Railroad Bridge, a truss bridge with a vertical lift. The dimmer upright shape and the dim shape parallel with the river are part of the St. Johns Bridge, a photo of which is included in my September 19 post. When I rode the SP 4449 on July 3, we crossed the Willamette River using that railroad bridge. Milton and Kay crossed it as they entered Portland. I altered this photo with the HDR-ish effect and put a frame around it.


Looking straight down to the east at Voodoo Doughnuts' original location on the corner of SW 3rd Avenue and SW Ankeny Street. See the tiny people in line from the red truck, along the front of the building and ending almost beneath the pink sign? Those are a few people in line for doughnuts in the middle of the afternoon--that's the hold that Voodoo has on folks, some folks anyway; to tell you the truth there are usually a whole lot more people in line. And the small, almost school-bus-colored items side-by-side in SW Ankeny are actually wooden picnic tables, while the black and white spots farther on are actually umbrellas over additional picnic tables. Portland decided in late July to make this portion of SW Ankeny car-free, a sort of patio area. The bit of a bridge that you can see on the left is the Burnside Bridge. See the MAX train in the trees, about two thirds of the way up from the bottom of the photo? It's crossing alongside the Skidmore Fountain in what's known as Ankeny Plaza. All through those trees where the three cars are parked you'll find the Portland Saturday Market which continues to the white arches topped with bricks and across the street and beneath the rest of the trees. The gray area between the trees and the river is the sort of plaza just south of the rest of the Saturday Market.

A few views of Portland from the 30th floor of the Big Pink

August 23, with Milton and Kay, I enjoyed my city from on high, through these views from the Portland City Grill in downtown.


Looking south along SW 5th Avenue. I cropped and altered with image at Picnik with the HDR-ish effect.


Looking southeast with the Morrison Bridge in the foreground--it's undergoing work to replace the open steel grating on the lift span. I cropped and sharpened the image a little bit at Picnik.


Looking mostly south down the Willamette River. The bridges, from the foreground back--the Hawthorne Bridge, the Marquam Bridge, and then the Ross Island Bridge. This photo has been cropped and sharpened at Picnik.

More views soon.

Out and about with Milton and Kay, Tuesday, August 23

Up early, coffee and protein drink, and then to the bus for a ride north of the apartment to try out the Cadillac Cafe on NE Broadway. I found it on the Internet and thought it looked worth a shot, plus it was near a Goodwill that we didn't make on Monday, one we could walk to after brunch.


While we waited across the street from the Lloyd Center, a great big shopping center, to transfer to our third and final bus for the trip, this hard-working young woman road through the intersection on her Soup Cycle.


We boarded the bus, and on the way to NE Broadway, I took this photo of another busy bicyclist.

Here you see my glass of orange juice, Milton's omelette, and my breakfast. Kay got the same thing I did, but with fried eggs. I forgot to take a photo of her plate. I did get two photos of the Cadillac that has its own special space inside the cafe.



We walked to the Goodwill after we ate, then walked over to the Barnes & Noble at Lloyd Center so that Milton and Kay could look for a DVD, "Oregon Splendor," that they'd watched with friends at home. They wanted their own copy to take back to Mississippi with them. There was one copy of it in the store. On the way to Lloyd Center we walked by this sculpture, "In the Tree Tops" by Margarita Leon.


After we left the shopping center, we walked south to the MAX stop so that we could get on board and ride to catch MAX Yellow Line at the Rose Garden and then ride north to Lombard where we boarded a bus that we rode to St. Johns. We got off there and walked a couple of blocks so that we could see the St. Johns Bridge. It's a beautiful bridge.


Soon we retraced our route, bus back to MAX and got off downtown so that we could make our way to the 30th floor of the Big Pink and hopefully get to sit at the windows in the bar at the Portland City Grill where we planned to have something to drink and a little snack to tide us over until supper time. From the MAX car, I took this photo of an art car at a service station. It's a hoot!


Speaking of art, here is a photo of two of the cairns on NW 5th Avenue which are part of the public art that one finds here and there along the MAX lines. I took it from inside the MAX car.

Here's what the TriMet pamphlet has to say about the Cairns:

Christine Bourdette, Cairns, 2008 Silver ledgestone, NW 5th and 6th between Irving and Glisan
My inspiration for Cairns came from the man- made stacks of stones that have historically served as landmarks for navigation, memorials, rituals and commemorative markers all over the world. Travelers on cross-country hiking trails traditionally add stones to cairns as they pass, resulting in animated and sometimes precarious stacks of rocks and pebbles. This evidence of our comings and goings, often in rather comical human form, signify safety and reassurance in the wilderness. In the urban wilderness, finding one’s way through the various stages of hurry-up-and- wait is just as significant. I am fascinated with all the ways my fellow citizens and I learn how to navigate our surroundings. My specific intention for these stacked stone forms was to mark the path to the light rail stations as well as to celebrate points of arrival and departure.
Masonry: Cliff Townsend Masonry, Inc. Oregon City, OR

Oh, before I forget. We got a table at the windows. Come back tomorrow for the views!