Just Before Goose Hollow

Nice to be back in Portland.  My third time and now certainly I’ll come more often.  My older daughter is beginning her undergraduate studies here now.  The two campuses of Reed and Lewis and Clarke blur in my mind.  I remember the prior had the elevated walk through the woods and the latter had that remarkable manner house, but much of what else distinguished them is hazy in my mind.  We’ll head over to Reed tomorrow.

Today we take the our many, many bags of luggage and file out into the special line they have for Lyft customers.  I’ve ordered an extra-large SUV and true to form for the Portland stereotype, the gent who arrives couldn’t be friendlier, helps with the luggage, and we’re soon cruising along the Willamette River, learning about how happy this gent is to live here.  He’s taken us to the Residence Inn, not far from the river, beneath an overpass in what I learn is in fact, an old part of town.

The room’s not ready.  Oh, but it’s a nice one, we’re assured.  We leave our many, many bags and go to get some lunch.  As I did whenever we were on college tours together, I suggest we sample one of the many vegan places in town.  There are no shortage of vegan joints in Portland.  Ichiza is not far from the downtown Target, where we’ll need to do our pre-dorm shopping and soon, we’ve another upbeat, Portland Lyft driver cruising us over, until we meet a family bike event which slows things to a crawl, just before Goose Hollow. 

Ichiza is small and packed at 2:00PM which is a good sign.  Soon we have our table for four off to the side, beneath an interesting poster of two white guys in kimono-like attire out in the woods.  A large guy in a skirt, generously tattooed, is soon walking us through their family-style menu.  Japanese food, vegan or otherwise, is perhaps the hardest of all cuisines to make work outside the Japanese archipelago and Ichiza was, in this regard, good but not great.  I had something billed as “Filipino comfort food,” which everyone seemed to think was the pick-of-the-litter.  At one table and another we could hear patrons purr with praise but to a person, we were underwhelmed.  No worries there appear to be at least twenty other vegan establishments we can sample in our daughter’s new, adopted home.

Sunday 8/25/19