Impressionists on the Water

Claude Monet, The Studio Boat 1874

Impressionists on the Water seems a continuation of the Fine Arts Museum’s successful exhibits of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist and like other institutions in the City, coincides with the America’s Cup competition. The exhibit documents how the significant role boating and sailing, which emerged as a middle-class leisure activity in France in the mid nineteenth century, the lives of French Impressionists and Post-Impressionists. Not as inspiring as its previous Impressionist exhibits it has a number Monet and Tolouse-Latrec’s wonderful work. I discovered Henri Riviere’s Night at Sea, a mesmerizing lithograph of blue sea and sky, and Ludovic Napoleon Lepic’s Boats on the Beach at Berch, which has both abstract and representational elements. 

Edouard Vuillard The Boatman 1897

Ashland

Italian soda and latte

Parallel play at the cafe

the Umpqua river

the man is crazy to swim in the cold river.

Portland

Every road trip must have a sound track....

Portland was a wonderful city—green, open, warm, eclectic, friendly, with a great deal of creative energy. It had the vibe of San Francisco without the edge and tenseness. There is no sales tax and prices so when you get your bill there is no mark up in taxes as you expect in California. It is a quiet city of humble and magnificent homes delineated with green spaces throughout. It is a foodie city as well. We were told that Portlanders are not afraid of fat and bacon because they exercise and ride their bike everywhere. I could live there.

When we arrived, we went to the McMinamin's Kennedy School, a former elementary school that was converted to a restaurant, bars (Portland is the land of microbrews), a theater and a hotel. Amazing how tastefully it was preserved and converted.

the Cypress Room, decorated with a variety of light shades, was a former classroom

funky, creative Alberta Street

At the Japanese garden

Multnomah Falls, 30 minutes east of Portland along the Columbia River 

View of the Columbia from Vista Point

 Downtown Portland:

At the Ace Hotel

Beef Tartare at Tasty and Alder.

bacon maple bar--yummy

I had to try a Voodoo doughnut

Swedish pancakes on our last day in Portland on Clinton Street

to Oregon

On our way to Oregon, we stopped in Dunsmuir for lunch. It was an open, warm town with charming details.

Parlier used to have good water, too until someone contaminated it with chlorine.

The Amtrak station still had a pay phone.

We met an engaging designer, Nathan, who has his roots in the town and wants to bring creative endeavors to the town.