Portland stirs time gone by

I’ve spent the last few days in Portland, Oregan, having arrived from the beach town of San Diego.

Why do I like this place?

“How do I love thee?  Let me count thy ways.”

For a start, it’s cooler. I don’t normally dig the cold but the lower temperatures are a novelty after travelling through India and while San Diego isn’t hot at this time of year, its weather is more akin to India’s warmer climate than the cool of North West USA.

So Portland is different to what I've been around lately - the people are rugged up, in an alternative, down to earth sort of way and remind me of the type of person one sees around Brunswick or Auckland and Wellington in New Zealand.  Many of the men have bushy beards, most people under 40 are tattooed and everyone wears a wool beanie.

Portland is set among a beautiful landscape, the air is cool and crisp and the place has a friendly vibe.  It seems colder (in spring) than Melbourne's winter – so climate wise and population size (close to 600,000) it has more in common with New Zealand or Tasmania.

It is clear from earlier blog posts that I have a fondness for New Zealand.  Add to that Tassie, I went twice to Hobart for weekend getaways last year to see MONA (Museum of Old and New Art) and both times ate at the fabulous 'foodie' restaurant Garagistes.

Today on St Paddy’s Day in a quaint, little bar called Interurban in the Portland suburb of Mississippi, I sat at the bar with wooden interior, three mounted deer on the walls, across from rows of whisky bottles (single malt a certain young Kiwi's favourite tipple) and I fell quickly down memory lane.  I found myself reminiscing about that short, sweet interlude in South Island, NZ, where I sat in a bar similar to Interurban  - with my company drinking whisky - and despite the chill outside, felt warm.

All this wrapped in, Portland has been a special place for me to visit.  But it’s also in part for these reasons why I choose not settle here.

Life’s like that. You don’t get too far ahead living in the past.

I head to Seattle on Tuesday. Surely I won’t feel the same romantic sense I do here (having said that, my early 20s were heavily influenced by the Seattle grunge scene and there’s a lot of film and TV that I’ve enjoyed that's set there (Sleepless in Seattle, Singles, Frasier, Grey’s Anatomy, The Killing)).

Seattle is renowned for its hi-tech community, Bill Gates founded Microsoft there.  It’s where savvy entrepreneurs take risks backing ‘start-up’companies setting their sights on a successful future. 

Not a bad place on premise.


Photos - the Portland bar Interurban.

I once was lost but now I'm found

It seems rather apt – given I am a person of faith and in the world’s most spiritual country - that my six week journey through India comes to an end in the holy place of Rishikesh. Not surprising also that I’ve had to put the brakes on my usual traveller’s pace as I finally (we all knew it had to happen right?) succumbed to ill health – run down immune system and upset stomach.

So the last few days in India have been taking it easy and resting in the divine surrounds of the Himalayan foothills by the sacred river Ganges.  I've basked in the nostalgia that this was the place one of my favourite childhood bands (thanks to my dad, mum was more an Elvis fan) The Beatles spent three months to attend an advanced Transcendental Meditation (TM) training session at the ashram of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

Rishikesh attracts its spiritual seekers and yogis gravitate here – the latter currently in abundance for the International Yoga Festival 2013 which carries through the first week of March annually.

I would have liked more time to travel through this expansive country – however to satisfy US visa requirements – I must press on.

Irrespective, it feels time to farewell India this trip. 

I recall saying to my friend Fleur before leaving Melbourne: “I’d like to give it more than six weeks but that’s all I’ve got” and her response was: “I think you’ll get there and find six weeks is enough!”  As usual, she was right.

I met a Canadian here in Rishikesh who has been travelling every Canadian winter for seven years.  His website is www.ronperrier.net.  Ron’s latest post Practical Travel Advice in India describes what one sees in all the Indian towns I’ve visited well.

Ron practiced as a doctor and saved the amount he knew was needed to see the world on his terms.

In a way that’s how I feel about my own path. I’d too like to see the world. I think travelling sets one free and what better feeling (outside love) than that of freedom?

As I read today in a book I bought from one of the many spiritual bookstores in Rishikesh – the thought of a situation (in my case, long-term travel through unknown countries) can terrify us more than the reality.  

Photo - The Beatles, Rishikesh, February 1968.

Postscript - the title of this blog post was inspired by of course the hymn Amazing Grace, but more timely I was listening to the version recorded by musician Krishna Das and Sting while writing this.  I bought three of Krishna Das' CDs in Rishikesh. Krishna Das hails from the US and under the guidance of an Indian guru found a new and awakened life.  He sounds free.  All things said, it seemed right.