Additional Badgers… part 2 Being a relatively new resident of North America, amusing beasties such as raccoons and skunks still have me pointing and exclaiming with delight. I am still not 100% sure of appropriate creature encounter behaviour. I think I’ve got the basics of bear etiquette down – it’s all in the claws, apparently […]
Tag Archives | Travel Writing
Hellhole of the Pacific… the final part
While my travelling companion wrestles with a belligerent windscreen wiper, I pop into a gas station to pick us up some refreshments. Stepping into the brightly lit store, a fakey doorbell DING! announces my entry and a slow drawl comes from the back, “Be out in a minute.” “No hurry,” I say, scanning for the […]
Hellhole of the Pacific… part 2
In Seattle Greyhound Station, disheveled and disgruntled passengers slump in molded plastic chairs. A tumult of arcade machines chirp, ca-ching and whistle off to one side. From the numbers of slumpers, it looks like unless I perfect professional glowering skills and attain truly shocking levels of pungency in the half hour before the bus leaves, […]
Hellhole of the Pacific… part 1
… or the time I thought it would be amusing to visit Aberdeen, Washington. The Scottish Aberdeen has merely two tame nicknames: The Granite City and the Silver City. Its progeny Aberdeen, Washington, is way ahead. For a town of only 16,000, it has a bristle of aliases. There’s The Gateway to the Olympic Peninsula, […]
The American Way
I’m back in Portland after my first Highland Games and on the phone to my mum. I tell her about the knight with the chain mail and the visor and she guffaws. I tell her that the only recognizable bits of our Scotland were a few chocolate bars, the fish and chips, and the pricey […]
All fun and Games
Portland Highland Games – my first ever Highland Games, is not actually in Portland. It’s in Gresham, Oregon, a good 45 minutes’ drive from the city – a small distance in North American terms, almost the entire width of the country at some points in Scottish terms. Erin, Michelle and I make our way to the […]
The Ambassador
The severe-sounding Portland Oregon Visitor Authority, in the form of the enthusiastic Vero, is taking two other writers, Andrew from New Mexico and Dan from New York, and I to see the city’s big event, the Rose Festival parade. Born out of the world’s fair that celebrated the centennial of the 1804-1806 Lewis and Clark […]
Portland, Oregon, and Sloe Gin Fizz
“Well Portland Oregon and sloe gin fizz, if that ain’t love then tell me what is. Well I lost my heart it didn’t take no time, but that ain’t all. I lost my mind in Oregon.” So warble Loretta Lynn and Jack White on the track, “Portland, Oregon.” It seems that Loretta and Jack are […]
