Highlands Saturday

Because there was a film festival to attend and a new restaurant to try, the bulk of Saturday was spent in the Highlands neighborhood of Denver. 

I attended two separate film sessions at the Festivus Film Festival.  Both were at the Oriental Theater, which is a cool, old theater that I had never been inside. 

Session 1: 2:00 pm “Doc Double” – two documentaries back to back.  These were supposed to be inspiring documentaries about the triumph of the human spirit and so on.  The first one was about surfing and helping kids on Bali surf and get money for school.  It was mostly surfing.  If you’re not a surfer and/or don’t know anything about surfing, all the surfing shots look the same.  It was chilly in the theater so I wrapped myself in the tee shirt I won and nodded off.

The second documentary was the draw for this session – “Conquest of High Passes.”  Disabled cyclist traveling through the Himalayas and persevering.  It turned out to be a little dour.  The whole thing felt like rainy day wrapped in a wet blanket.  I blame this on the cyclist on which the film focused.  He was alternately talking about what an inspiration he was and talking about how horrible everything was. 

The next session wasn’t until 6:00 pm, meaning there was time to check out the area.  Lots of house-shops (i.e. little local shops in converted houses), art galleries, and coffee shops.  In one gallery/framing shop (metro frame works) there were to shop dogs – Greyhounds! 

They also had some art by artist Chris Vance that appealed to me.  This is just one example:

Since the break between sessions was so long, there was time to shoot over to the 32nd/Lowell area for a stroll.  More cute shops.  I love this octopus mural.

Dinner was at Hops & Pie (specializing in craft brew and artisan pizza).   The pizza was pleasantly tasty but the beer on tap was really special.  Here’s a bit of the draft beer menu:

I had the Oaked Arrogant Bastard (you don’t get that on tap too often!):

After dinner it was back to the film festival for Session 2: Laugh Track Short Films.  These were much more satisfying than session one’s documentaries.   Many of them were witty and at least half had me actually laughing out loud!  “Chump and Clump” was my favorite – two animated dudes and their adventures at a bus stop!

Afterwards was the last stop of the evening – Forest Room 5 – for a final beer.  This is somewhere I don’t get to very often because it’s in the Highlands but it’s an eclectic place that has various sized logs for bar stools and old farming and mining films playing silently behind the bar.  It is always pretty crowded. 

That was my Saturday! 

Portland y'all! - part I

As some of you already know, Portland, Oregon, is an amazing place. We've just returned from 3 days of play there. This is part one. Note: We ate and drank with no thought to our poor bodies and livers - so, this post has many food references.

We arrived at the Northwest Hostel at about noon on Thursday afternoon. However, the actual first stop was, literally, Saint Cupcake - I mean, it's on the way to the hostel...this is what we saw upon arrival! We got 3 "dots" (mini cupcakes) each and they were heavenly. The vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream icing topped with pink sugar crystals - the crunchy, sweet, cakey goodness - was especially memorable for me.

It rained while we ate the cupcakes and was cloudy most of the day afterward but, luckily, didn't rain more than a sprinkle again the entire time we were there.

So, we headed for the Hawthorne Neighborhood across the Willamette River. We wandered about on foot and ate at the Por que No? Taqueria (Hawthorne and 47th), which was delicious. This is coming from someone who doesn't prefer corn tortilla and is skeptical of taquerias. Along with my chicken taco with tomatillo sauce and onions, I got this great watermellon-guava juice that was super refreshing. This is us at the place:



This lunch was, of course, followed by dessert! Very close by was JaCivas Bakery, where we got an apple slice and an aztec cinnamon truffle. Afterward, we found Zupan's Market, which, in my opinion, gives Dean & Deluca (we've visited the location in Georgetown in D.C. many times in the past) a run for its money. Their produce in particular was outstanding. This is Sandy using an amazingly large artichoke as a prop:


More wandering - here is some puffin grafitti:


One of the meals we (and Sandy in particular) were looking forward to was dinner at Ken's Artisan Pizza. We arrived about 5 minutes after it opened and it was already filling up. We ate some fantastic wood oven pizza and drank rich, red wine in the mid-evening sun. Here is Sandy with his mushroom pizza:


We visited a nearby wine bar after, Noble Rot, and got a flight of Willamette Valley pinot noir and a flight of Southern Spanish reds. I preferred the pinots - all fantastic. The place itself was really a perfect neighborhood winebar. You know, it had all the elements: small plate menu of local food, a row of large windows that open up to the street, soothing yet upbeat music, a wonderful selection of wines. This is a horrible picture of S but gives some feel of the mellow location:

We hopped the 20 bus back to the Northwest neighborhood, where we capped the night with some Rogue beer right off the tap from the brewery! See me below near the end of the evening and feeling pretty good:
We adjourned to our private room at the best hostel in North America and slept an amazing sleep while breathing in lots of oxygen.

Ok, that was Thursday. Next - Friday!