Northwest Grille - December 15, 2007

9900 SW Canyon Rd (Shilo Inn)
Portland, OR



This was my pick. I wouldn't have picked this normally because A) it is part of Shilo Inn hotel which is a chain; and B) it is part of Shilo Inn hotel. But, it had a grand write up in the Oregonian a couple of days before we went; so I figured, what the heck. If we can find a good breakfast place on the westside, I'm game.

Well, in a word, "Ugh". Typical hotel restaurant food. I had the "Meat Lover's Scramble". The spuds were cool, there wasn't much meat, and the cheese on top wasn't melted. Service was nice enough.

I guess, I'll have to bite the bullet and head back to the east side of the river for a decent breakfast next time.

China Delight - November 24, 2007

Address: 8975 SW Beaverton Hillsdale

I definitely wasn't on my "A" game for blogging; I didn't have my PDA; didn't get a picture; and didn't pick up a business card. So, bear with me.

I may be off on the date by a week. There was a little bit of snow was spitting at us on the drive and it seems like we talked about Christmas trees.

The most interesting place about this restaurant is that it is a Chinese restaurant in the evenings; but in the mornings it is "Carma's American Breakfast" restaurant. I think the name is Carma's. Some folks lease the place and serve breakfast when the building would otherwise be idle. What a great idea.

I do remember I had a scramble which was okay. If I remember correctly, their motto was they had the best breakfast in Beaverton. Well, based on my experience that isn't saying much; there just aren't that many good breakfast places in our neck of the woods. But if I was going to vote for a best, I'd pick Murrayhill Cafe over this spot. But, I would consider going back here.

Podnah's

I can't remember ever having biscuits and gravy before, so I considered myself a Biscuits and Gravy virgin. That is until Podnah's. And the first time was truly great! Really, really good biscuits with yummy gravy on the side, which I appreciated because I could control the amount of gravy I got in each bite. The sausage was spicy and tasty and I didn't feel that it was greasy at all. Howard was kind enough to share his scrambled eggs with me, so I considered my breakfast just about perfect.

The only downfall was not having any decaf coffee AND no herbal teas that I could drink. I was about to settle for a cup of hot water, when the waitress suggested that I go the coffee shop next door and get my coffee. That turned out to be just fine. The Bean is a nice little shop with a very friendly proprietor who was happy to fix me a decaf Americano. We visited with the owner for a bit while he fixed my coffee, and by the time we got back to Podnah's, our order was almost ready. That made for a short wait.

From what I observed, it looks like Podnah's uses French Presses to make their coffee, and then puts the coffee in hot pots for the customers to serve themselves. Since I use a French Press at home, I'm sure I would have enjoyed their coffee had I been able to drink it.

Deducting a half point for the shortness of the menu, and another half point for not being able to accommodate my drink needs, I'd rate this place at four stars.

November 17, 2007 Podnah's Pit BBQ

Yum!

There are some foodies in my office; Jeff and/or Brendan have set as a goal to eat their way through the top 10 restaurants in Portland as rated by Portland Monthly magazine. They had lunch at Podnah's Pit BBQ in Northeast and raved about it. I looked on the web and found that they started opening for breakfast just about a month ago. So, it definitely sounded like a candidate.

When I looked at the menu on-line I knew I'd be happy but that the others might have a hard time getting something they like. But hey, we rotate picking and I figured I'd please myself and hope the others would find something they liked. The menu is very short.

• Biscuits and gravy
• Smoked trout hash
• 2 breakfast burritons (with or without sausage)
• Ham, eggs, and grits

I wanted someone to order the trout hash so I could at least see it; if someone has it, please post a comment.

I love good biscuits and gravy but rarely order it because it can be so easily ruined; a floury paste with a couple of chunks of greasy pork served over a hockey puck.

But Podnah's knows there biscuits and gravy: there were huge chunks of spicy sausage in a creamy, peppery gravy; no lumps; no grease. The gravy was served in a soup cup alongside two wonderful, light, flaky biscuits. I also had a couple of scrambled eggs on the side. Make no mistake: if you want biscuits in gravy in Portland, go to Podnah's.

The ambience is very VERY low key; it strikes me as what a southern barbecue joint would be. It is a small, narrow building with small old fashioned kitchen tables lining both sides. There were only a couple of spots for 4 people; we actually pushed a couple of small tables together. A few pictures are on the wall. Suffice it to say, if you are going to Podnah's you are going for the food.

There are a couple of small things that keep this from rating 5 stars in my book. They had NO decaffinated coffee. After we ordered, Dianne and Carla ducked out and went next store to get a coffee from a little coffee shop and brought it in. Also, we had to go fetch our own coffee from the back of the shop and the cups were little. But for a little breakfast joint that delivers the goods, this rates 4 1/2 stars.

Podnah's Pit BBQ

1469 NE Prescott St

Veritable Quandry

I enjoyed this restaurant very much. I also had the Eggs Benedict on the homemade english muffins. I generally don't get anything Benedict because I don't care for the sauce which is usually too lemony or tart for my taste. This sauce was just right and the english muffin was good. It was dense, as Howard mentioned, and not at all crispy, but still good.



The service was good and the company was delightful, as usual, with the added benefit of having Murray there, too. It was nice to get to meet Jeff's future father-in-law.



When we ate here a few years ago, I had the steel-cut oats for breakfast. It was so creamy and tasty with just the right amount of fruit, sugar, and cream. I loved it! I was glad to see it was still on the menu. I would have had it again, but it just wasn't an oatmeal kind of day for me.



I would give the VQ four stars for ambience, service, and quality of my breakfast.

November 10, 2007 - Veritable Quandry

We had a special visitor to our group this week. Carla and my son's, fiance's dad, Murray Slovick. He lives in New Jersey and came out for the weekend to visit his daughter's future in-laws. He is extremely charming and we had a blast.

We wanted to show him "Portland" and so wanted a real nice downtown experience. It was a toss up between Mother's Bistro and The Veritable Quandry. We've been to both before and enjoyed them both. The ambience, architecture, and location of VQ won out. So we headed there for breakfast.

Here's the regular 4; Murray was at the controls of his camera.

Ohmygosh; if I walk down the street with that expression, I bet people give me a wide berth.

So many choices, it was hard to decide. I opted for the local made sausage with currants, along with eggs and a potato cake. The sausage was delicious; the eggs were, well... eggs: fried over-medium. The potato cake was a little dense and maybe I was just full, but I didn't eat it all; it wasn't compelling.

Murray (and I think Herb) had the Eggs Benedict on a home made English muffin; they seemed pretty whelmed (not overwhelmed or underwhelmed, just whelmed) by the muffin - dense like the potato cake.

After breakfast, Herb and Dianne headed home, where I think Herb had to install a new toilet. Carla, Murray, and I walked on the Hawthorne bridge where I got a picture of Murray and Carla:

A pretty nice picture of the waterfront; too bad I only had my phone camera.

From there we took the tram up to OHSU, then explored Powell's, the Pearl, Pioneer Courthouse Square, where they were putting up the Christmas tree, and quick drive through Ladd's Addition in the Hawthorne area.

For dinner that night (I know, I know, this is a breakfast blog) we ate at Higgins, which is my favorite restaurant in Portland. If you are in Portland for a night, I recommend Higgins without reservation (well, actually you may want to make a reservation).

Next up is November 17; I have a couple of places in mind. I'll try to get a report out soon.

I've also made up a little breakfast blog card the size of a business card with the blog URL on it; maybe we'll get a little traction with this.

November 3 - No breakfast

Dianne was out of town visiting relatives, and Carla went out early morning walking with a friend. I slept in and I'm not sure what Herb did.

This week our son's fiance's dad is coming in from New Jersey to visit Carla and me. We are thinking about taking him to The Veritable Quandry in downtown Portland. We've been there in the fall of 2003 and it rated 4 stars. I don't have notes or details from the visit, but I remember liking the bread.

So, we should have a real report next week!

Beginning

Hello, my name is Howard and I'm a train fan.

I live in Beaverton, OR; but grew up in Palmdale, California (Southern Pacific went right through town) and I'd go to La Posada in Winslow, Arizona to watch the Santa Fe railroad in action.

Every few months I go out and take train pictures. I've tried to post them to train picture sites, but never get them accepted. So, I figured, what the heck, I'll make my own blog and post my own pictures!

Other blogs I maintain are

• 4forbreakfast.blogspot.com: A blog of 4 empty nesters who go around eating breakfast in the Portland area


• 2for66.blogspot.com: A blog of my trip with my wife along Route 66 from Santa Monica to Gallup, New Mexico

Earlier this month my wife and I went to Tucson, Arizona to visit our son who is a middle school band director. The occasion was his first ever band concert as a director. While he was working one day, I went out and grabbed some pictures of the Union Pacific. Here is one picture

No group breakfast October 13/20

We didn't go out with Herb and Dianne on either October 13 or 20.

October 13

Carla and I were in Tucson on October 13 visiting our son, Andrew who is a middle school band director at a middle school there. He had his first ever band concert as a director and it was smash hit! We also got to see him perform in the salsa band Descarga at John Jacob's El Parador. We did have some nice breakfasts with Andrew, our niece Annie who is doing an Optometric clinical rotation, and Andrew's girlfriend Sally.

If you are in Tucson we highly recommend Ghini's for their Eggs Provencal with roasted tomatoes and thyme. We also like the cafe in the Congress Hotel across from the train depot.


I totally messed up and didn't get any pictures of Sally; but here is a nice picture of Andrew and Annie taken at the Pima Air Museum southeast of Tucson.

I do have a raft of pictures of trains in Tucson taken Friday morning while we were waiting for Andrew to finish work. ;)

October 20
Herb and Dianne were visiting relatives up on Mt. Hood last weekend so Carla and I were on our own. We went back to Nancy's Kitchen and had another helping of corned beef hash. Yum again.

Broder Scandanavian Restaurant - October 27, 2007

Very good!

Herb picked a good one this week (as usual). This is a small Swedish/Scandanavian restaurant on Clinton around 25th Street. (2508 SE Clinton St.). We ate here a few years ago when it was Henry's; I rated that as 3 stars but have no date or comment on the place. But the new tenant serves a wonderful breakfast.

A lot of traditional (I guess) Scandanavian items were on the menu. There were 3 or 4 things I wanted to try, but decided to go with the Swidish Breakfast Bord. It consisted of a board with lots of tasty bits:

• Rye crisp
• Walnut toasts
• Salami
• Smoked trout
• Grapefruit
• Yogurt and honey
• Lingonberry jam
• Hard cheese

I liked EVERYTHING on the plate. The smoked trout was definitely the winner. The grapefruit was pink and sweet, Herb didn't like it though as I squirted him in the eye at least twice as I was eating. The cheese was hard and a little salty. All in all this was an excellent breakfast. It was nice to eat a breakfast like this and not come away all full and lethargic.

Herb had the hash and I don't think he was as happy with it, he said it tasted like burnt popcorn (ugh). His rating will probably be less than mine.

The only dings are that the coffee was not hot; so if you didn't drink it quickly then you'd have 1/2 a cup of cold coffee. And service was a little slow; although our waiter was very nice and helpful.

I recommend this as a good place to go for a break from the traditional eggs and spuds.

I keep forgetting to get pictures; this picture is of Dianne and Carla as we left. I'm trying to remember to get more pictures.

Overlook Restaurant

The Overlook is the workhorse of breakfast places. There's nothing trendy about it; but it is no greasy spoon either. It's a good place to go when you want eggs, your favorite breakfast meat, shredded hash browns and toast or pancakes, waffles, etc. I had eggs and German sausage and it was fine. The eggs were the way I ordered them. The sausage was sliced and grilled and tasty.

The restaurant was clean and the wait staff was friendly. They had several big screen TVs up and running the news on Saturday, which distracted me a little bit; but if you're just in there for a quick bite, you might enjoy it.

They have a lunch and dinner menu, as well, and their dessert case was the first thing I noticed when we came in the door. The last thing I noticed on our way out the door was a GIANT cinnamon roll in the case. It was reminiscent of the rolls that the old Rose's used to offer in NW Portland. The Overlook also offers Cinnamon French Toast, and I was thinking that maybe I should have ordered that.

Overlook Restaurant - October 6, 2007

I changed my mind about going to The Roxy; just couldn't face the thought of surly waitstaff this morning. Instead, we went to The Overlook Restaurant at 1332 N Skidmore Street in North Portland just west of I5 and just north of the Fremont Bridge. Portland Citysearch has it listed as a Greek restaurant; but it didn't seem like it to me. It is pretty much a basic diner and deserves maybe 2 1/2 stars. The waitstaff were very pleasant (a big plus), but we didn't get any more coffee once they figured we had finished breakfast.

I had a waffle and bacon; pretty basic stuff. All-in-all not a special restaurant for comemerating (sp?) the first posting in over a year and a half.

We have gone past this place a few times in our jaunts to North Portland and St. Johns. Carla and I saw it again last weekend when we were headed to the Polish Festival which is held next to Kaiser hospital the last weekend of September.

I got a little micro SD card for my phone and spent most of the time at breakfast trying to figure out how to get my pictures to the card so I could then get them to my computer and post to the blog. Finally, I got a picture of the restaurant sign, which is what originally interested me and made me move it to the top of my list.

And a picture of Dianne:

Hopefully Dianne, Herb, and Carla will reactivate their accounts and post their thoughts.

Start it up (Again)

Changes

We've been going to breakfast; we just haven't been blogging. I'm going to try to keep this up again and see how it goes.

One change is, that I don't think people can track us very well from our aliases, so we (at least Carla and I) are going to go by our real names.

I (Howard) originally started posting as "Bake" - from my mother's side of the family (Baker). Carla went as "Carlita".
So, Bake ==> Howard
Carlita ==> Carla

We'll let Rick and A.H. decide how they want to be identified. I know who they are :)

Preview of this week

It's my turn to pick this week and I'm starting to feel like the cupboard is getting bare. But I've felt like that before and we haven't run out of places yet.

I've been considering "The Roxy" on Stark, but it sounds like the wait staff are brutal. It reminds me of a place (forget the name) we went a while back that had a sandwich advertising board outside that said "You eat here because we let you". I just don't need that; wait staff aren't slaves, but if we are going out for a nice time, I just don't want to have to cut through a fog of bad attitude to get there.

Anyway, I think I found a place for Saturday; if I keep my energy up, I'll post an entry!

Day 14 - Home Again, Home Again, Jiggedy Jog

Thursday (July 12).


We had a wonderful time seeing the sights and visiting relatives and friends, but it was time to head home.

In keeping with our back roads theme we decided to take US 26 from Boise to Portland rather than I-84. If you are considering the same, I have 3 words of advice: DON'T DO IT. We had driving US 20 over to Eugene years ago; but US 26 is a whole different story. We spent hours winding through the Blue Mountains. It took us 10 hours to travel about 450 miles to get home. This is as long as it took us to get from Portland to Lathrop on our first day, when we travelled over 600 miles. It will be a long time before I am on Highway 26 east of Gresham and west of Boise.

There was a little interest on the way; somewhere in the mountains we encountered an enormous flock of butterflies. We saw thousands of butterflies; so many it was almost scary.

Finally Mt. Hood came into view.

We had put over 3,000 miles on the car and hit a lot of bugs. Here is a close-up of the front end when we got home.

The Final Numbers

Distance: 3,409 miles

Total in-car driving time: 71 hours 49 minutes.

Average MPH: 47

Average MPG: 29

In a day or two I'll post some final thoughts on the trip. Thanks to everyone for reading and following along.

P.S. To all of you who have pointed out that the sun probably sets in the west in Arizona; you are right. I knew they do weird stuff with DST there and thought maybe they had the sun turned around also. Carla had pointed out numerous places where I referenced the sun setting in the east; but I guess I didn't get them all. Keep the cards and letters coming.

Day 13 - Alive After 5

Wednesday July 11

After a little rest we did a bit more sight-seeing and then met up with more friends at the "Alive After 5" weekly outdoor music event in downtown Boise behind the Grove hotel.

We went up to the Boise train depot to see if we could see any trains; it looks like trains bypass downtown so we had no luck; but turning around I got a little picture of the Capitol and some of downtown Boise from the vantage point of the gardens in front of the depot.

The Chuck Close Exhibit

At Shannon's recommendation, we made a stop at the Boise Art Museum where we looked at the "Chuck Close Prints: Process and Collaboration" exhibit. It is fascinating. He does work that are basically mosaics based on photographs. He uses all sorts of media to render beautiful portraits. If you are in Boise (or anywhere else it is presented) we highly recommend you go. There is a 20-30 minute video of him talking describing the process.

You can find lots of information on him by Googling him; a couple of sites I found:

http://www.moma.org/exhibitions/1998/close/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Close

http://www.chuckclose.coe.uh.edu/ (This takes a while to open).

Alive After 5

Then we went back to the hotel and met up with Butch and others at "Alive After 5". Unfortunately I didn't have my camera. It was very hot out but Butch totally hooked us up with the place to hang out. It was on a veranda on the 2nd floor of the Qwest Arena which overlooks the pedestrian blocks where the weekly festival is held. We had a shady spot where we had tables and chairs, beers, and popcorn. Larry and his wife Jan were there when we showed up; they had just returned from taking a group of high school kids on a tour of Italy. Bob and his wife Cindy came, as did Maggie. Maggie's husband Doug couldn't make it; he had been up in McCall all day chopping wood. It was great catching up with all of them.

At the end of the night, Carla, Butch, and I got an outdoor seat at a bar where we had a drink before we turned in.

Days 12 and 13 - Boise

Days 12 and 13 (July 10)


It was a quick 5 hour, 304 mile drive from Ogen to Boise. The temperature rose from 82 at the outset to 93 in Boise when we arrived at 2:30.

Fires and smoke continue to be highlights. As we crossed the border on I-84 into Idaho, we saw a wild fire less than a mile from the freeway. I could see the flames and the smoke darkened things considerably as we drove by. Wish we would have gotten a picture, but the camera wasn't handy.

After checking into the hotel, we met my old friend Butch at a local brew-pub. Then headed to his house to catch the all-star game.


A little later some other friends dropped by for a chat. We went outside, watched a racoon ramble through the neighborhood,and caught up on each others' lives.

From left to right we have Shannon, Butch, Tom, Nancy, and Carla. I've known Shannon, Butch, Nancy since 1970 or 71. Tom is married to Nancy - a wonderful guy - I know because he likes trains too! Shannon's husband, Bruce, couldn't make it. He and I were in a small foreign literature class together at the College of Idaho (now Albertson College) back in the day. And when I say small, I mean small; he and I were the only two students in the class.

We got back to the hotel around 10:30 and crashed (figuratively, not literally). We woke up, went for a quick walk along the river, then met Brent and Robin for breakfast at a nice little cafe in downtown. They are both school teachers; Robin teaches 2nd grade and Brent teaches high school psychology, American History, and what-not.

We came back and I got the blog caught up. That brings us up to the minute. Tonight we'll meet some other friends at the "Alive After Five" in the grove just behind our hotel. Those pics probably won't get posted until we get back home on Thursday.

Our plan is to continue the back roads tour and take Highway 26 through John Day, rather than I-84 through the Columbia Gorge.

Day 11 - A Stop in Ogden

Day 11 (July 9)
One of our best days ever; even if the drive was not much to be excited about.

We left Moab at 8:20 with a cool 70 degrees and headed to Ogden, 270 miles to the north where we arrived at 1:15 PM where it was 93 degrees.

Shortly after we left, we got a call from Jeff who was visiting his girlfriend, Gillian's, parents in New Jersey. He told us that he had proposed marriage and Gillian accepted. Yahoo; we are so happy. We've seen Gillian twice now; once last Christmas, and again in June just after they finished their 2nd year of law school. They go to the same school and met two years ago; they were friends for the first year and became boyfriend/girlfriend this past September. We absolutely love and adore Gillian and are thrilled that they found one another. I have a nice picture of the two of them last month, but it must be on my home computer. Here is one from last Christmas.


Back to the trip
With the extended drought and excessive heat, a number of wild fires have broken out in the west. Utah has the biggest fire in its history (over 400,000 acres I believe). We definitely saw the effects in Arches National Park as the light was dimmed by a smoky haze over everything.

We were driving away from that fire but evidently were close to another; as the highway (191) parallelled a river we saw a helicopter swoop down and hover over the water to pick up a load to carry to a fire that must have been east of us. I had a great view of the helicoper hovering over the water, but couldn't get in on camera because we had passed it. But here is one image I got as it was closing in.



Although we had left the Transcon, I didn't see why it should stop me from taking train pictures!

Our hotel in Ogden was just a couple of blocks away from the historic old town, 25th street. We didn't eat here, but if the food is half as good as the sign... At the end of 25th Street is Ogden Union Station. Inside the station are 5 museums; we perused the railroad museum (big surprise), the model railroad museum, and the antique car museum. We had a couple of interesting docents leading tours. In the car museum, we were shown a license plate from 1944 when metal rationing meant no metal license plates. The gude asked me what I thought the plate was made from; I said "sheep skin". He misheard, looked at me and exclaimed "Cheesecake?!". He figured I was a total loss and turned to Carla for the answer. The correct answer was an early plastic.

I got behind the "wheel" of a locomotive cockpit where Carla grabbed a snap.
Outside, were a number of locomotives, cars, and cabooses. Carla liked this one:

Day 10 - Arches National Park

Sunday July 8 (I think)
We wanted to get an early start hiking in Arches National Park since it was so hot. We got a 6:00 wakeup call; had breakfast at the hotel and set out. We drove up to the trail head for Delicate Arch. It was a 2 hour walk; signs everywhere warned to take plenty of water. Our good friends Herb and Dianne did this walk and some additional a few years ago and they also warned us to take plenty of water. So, we headed out with 4 liters. I had a couple of liters on a belt holder thingy I had purchased before we left Portland and Carla had a container with a shoulder strap for another 1.5 liters; we carried a small bottle by hand to make the 2 liter / person recommendation. The walk was beautiful and once I figured we wouldn't die I started to enjoy it.

These photos may be nice, but I recommend you go look at it in person.



I thought we had done somehting special, then a Japanese family followed us up and the girls were wearing ballet shoes and flip-fops!

My favorite part was on the way down telling people they only had another hour to go when in fact they were just a few hundred yards away. Carla put an end to my fun though. We only needed half our water - because it was relatively cool whn we left. It was definitely warm when we came back; I was astonished to see so many people starting the walk at 10:30 in 90 degree + heat starting with just a small bottle or no water at all.

Close to the parking lot on the way back was a spot where there are petroglyphs from somewhere between 1600 and 1850 AD.

We continued to tour the park and took an easy .5 mile walk up to Double Arches
We then headed back for lunch and a quick doze. Then we went back for some more quick tours of Arches. We just did some short walks; in fact, lunch didn't agree with me, so I sat in the car a couple of times listening to the Dodgers on the radio while Carla did the foot tours. One of the most interesting rocks was Balancing Rock; I recommend you see it soon; in a few years it will be renamed "Falen Rock".

We ate dinner at the Desert Bistro; a wonderful place our friends the McDonnells told us about. It was the perfect end to a wonderful day.

The next day we were to get up and head off to Ogden Utah on our way to Boise. We heard some GREAT news that day (but you'll have to read that blog entry to get the details).

Day 9 - The Turn Toward Home

Saturday July 7 (I think)

Once again, I woke up before Carla and headed outside to get some last train pictures before we had breakfast and headed off. But, I don't have anything special to post.

We'd already seen what we wanted to see east of Winslow on Route 66 (see previous post on Holbrook and the Petrified Forest). Knowing we had a long day, we took a last look around Winslow and hit the road(s) to Moab, Utah.

Here are some pictures of our room and public areas at La Posada. I got a last Winslow train picture from our room.


Here are some images of our room.

Windows on 2 sides was nice (for a breeze, good light, and train action!)




The hallway looking from our room toward the front desk.

A picture from the front. They are still working on the landscaping for the entry way.

We checked out at 9:30, visited a couple of tourist shops in town and drove around the newer parts of Winslow on the west side. I got some cool souvenirs; one to be debuted at by next Trophy Husbands bowling night.

We pulled out of town at 10:25 where it was 87 degrees. We headed out I-40 to Gallup and turned north on US 491. This was the farthest east we would get. We pulled into Moab at 6:15 PM (1 hour ahead of Arizona time) where it was 102 degrees. Total distance was 382 miles. We had a bit of dinner downtown, then set a wake up call for the next morning when we would head out for a hike to the Delicate Arch in Arches National Park.

Day 8 - Winslow, Holbrok, Petrified Forest

We could hear trains all night; I don't think they were too loud, and Carla didn't even seem to mind. She said she has enjoyed all this more than she thought she would. I have a friend, Bud, who is a Notary Public. I think when we get back home, I'll have her sign an avadavit to that effect and have it notarized.

I woke up early and while Carla was still dozing, I went out back for some pictures. Here is a picture showing the back of the hotel; our room on the outer corner in the picture.
Here is a picture of our private patio. Marked off from the rest of the patio by the old baggage cart. That door goes into our room (Room 101 the FDR room).

I caught a picture of a crew building a train that would depart later in the morning.

We liked dinner the night before so much, we had breakfast in the Turquoise Room, then bid Jake and Sally adieu. We had come to realize that the travelling takes much longer than we had planned. Since the trip from Winslow to Moab, Utah was a long one, we decided to tour Route 66 east of Winslow today. This includes Holbrook, the Petrified Forest, and the Painted Desert. First stop was the Jack Rabbit between Winslow and Holbrook.

Then in Holbrook we saw the Wigwam Hotel. If we weren't so enamored with La Posada we would have stayed here a night.

We took a couple of hours driving through the Petrified Forest and Painted Desert National Park east of Holbrook. Here is a picture of a tree with part of its root structure intact.

We have LOTS of pictures of this area; but the light wasn't right; I may doctor a couple and post them later.

On the way back to Winslow we stopped at the industrial spur overpass on the west side. This is a spot I had really wanted to get a picture from. The wind was kicking up and it was getting close to dinner, but I lucked out and got a coupled of shots of a train headed east to Flagstaff with the sun at my back.

There were lots of Route 66 travellers at the hotel; after dinner we sat on rocking chairs with about a dozen other folks as a cooling breeze blew to keep us comfortable.
We saw 7 to 10 trains go by and I grabbed some shots as the sun set in the east.


A perfect end to a perfect day.

That night we had to move across the hall to the James Cagney room (100) and were lulled to sleep by the rail traffic through the night.

Day 7 - Winslow At Last

Before heading out from Sedona on Thursday morning I set up the tripod to get a picture of Carla, Andrew, and I. He then headed backto Tucson and we headed for Flagstaff, Walnut Canyon, and Winslow. Jake and Sally were also headed to Winslow so they could show us around. We took a quick stop in Flagstaff where we stopped at the depot (imagine that). While Carla went into the gift shop, I grabbed a couple of pictures of BNSF on the Transcon. I also grabbed a snap of the Grand Canyon cafe across Route 66 from the depot.

We headed out on old Route 66 to Winona, then doubled back on I-40 to Walnut Canyon to visit the ruins. The Sinagua people lived here in the cliffs long ago (you can look up the dates). Too bad Jake wasn't with us; after his days in education he worked for the National Park Service and knows all this stuff. I do know that Sinagua is Spanish for "without water". Theory has it that these people migrated from here and became the ancestors of the Hopi. Have I mentioned it has been hot? We passed on the opportunity to walk all through the canyon (we did when we were here back in 1989). Instead, we took the rim tour and grabbed a couple of so-so pictures.
There isn't much of the old Route 66 alignment left between Flagstaff and Winslow so we headed down I-40. We stopped (barely) at Twin Arrows. I think this is now private property; even though there is an exit from the freeway, there isn't a place to stop, much less park. But Carla found a little spot where I grabbed a couple of pictures. It sure has seen better days. I remember stopping there with my folks in the old days.

Then we checked in to La Posada and met up with Jake and Sally. He grew up in Winslow, taught for years and was the principal at Jefferson Elementary. We got a couple of pictures.

We had a lovely dinner with Jake and Sally at the Turquoise Room at the hotel. Our room had a private door with a patio on the back of the hotel looking on a garden and the train tracks. We sat for an hour or so and I got to listen to some great stories about Jake and the rest of my mom's family. It was a treasure. It was so much fun in fact, I didn't even take any train pictures!