Honeymoon Days Thirteen and Fourteen - The Kennedy School

We decided to spend our last two nights at The McMenamin's Kennedy School in the northeastern part of Portland. It is very close to the airport so we'll be able to zoom over there after checking out today.

The hotel is exactly as stated, an old elementary school that was built in the early 1900s and was later closed and renovated into a hotel complex. The gymnasium is now a meeting room, the old auditorium is now a theatre with comfy couches and tables for beer and food, detention is now a bar and all the old classrooms are now guest rooms (complete with chalk boards). We stayed in Mrs. Palmer's room, who was a 6th grade teacher at the school.

We were able to watch three movies while we were here (In Bruges, Horton Hears a Who?, and 21), all of which are free to guests of the hotel. Altough the Kennedy School isn't a resort as most imagine one, it does provide all amentities needed to stay on the premises for an entire day (or weekend). There is even a soaking pool in an outdoor garden which we made good use of yesterday for a half hour.

We did leave on Sunday for a walk down to Alberta Ave. for a fabulous mexican dinner at La Bonita and doughnuts for dessert at Tonalli's (much better than Voodoo). The neighborhood between the Kennedy School and Alberta Avenue reminded us of home although we have nothing like the Alberta strip in Raleigh, sadly.

Our plane departs in two hours and we are catching a cab to the airport, buying some snacks for the plane and hopefully picking up a copy of David Sedaris's new book which comes out today called When You are Engulfed in Flames. A great book to get us back in the North Carolina state of mind (if only because he is from Raleigh).

And last but not least, GOBAMA!

Honeymoon Day Twelve - Lights, Camera, Parade Action

We started the day at about noon as usual, getting coffee and OJ and slowly making our way to the streets of Portland. The is a deli, Kenny and Zuke's, beside of the Ace that we kept thinking of trying and finally decided to keep our day local and have lunch there.

After eating lunch and skimming through the morning papers, we decided to go see another film across the street at the Living Room Theatres. Before the show, Stacy ran down to American Apparel to buy a hoodie that she had been looking for all trip. The film that was showing at 3pm was an Austrian film called The Counterfeiters. It is based on a true story and won the Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars this past year, the first Austrian movie to receive this honor. Altough a bit hard at times and sad, the film was a fascinating story that was very well directed and acted. Two thumbs up!

After the movie, we went back up to our room and Stacy took a nap while Jed ran a couple of errands around the block. While out, Jed saw the initial staging and setup for all the floats that were going to be in the evening's Starlight Parade. The sun wasn't down yet so the lights weren't on, but from the amount of lights on the floats, they were sure to be bright later.

Since this was our last night at The Ace Hotel, we decided to walk down to the Thai restaurant, Typhoon, where we ate on our first night at The Ace. It was fantastic the first night and again it was just as good. We chose different things from the menu this time and were able to see all of the parade crowd gathering on the street in front of the restaurant. After dinner we walked through the crowds, watching children throwing footballs and playing with light sabers in the streets.

We were lucky enough to find a spot at the corner of 10th and Stark, just in front of our hotel at The Living Room Theatre to set up for the parade. We sat at a table just outside the theatre and were able to have drinks and play Scrabble while waiting for the parade to start. After we arrived, the area around us became very crowded and people were standing in front of us, blocking our view, but we still had one of the best seats around. Later we realized that the best seat was our hotel room, where we could see all of the floats from a third floor window (some video below). After two games of Scrabble, both of which Stacy won, we went back up to the room to watch the end of the parade and call it a night.

A lazy day in the neighborhood.

Streetside Scrabble



Scrabble, Beer, and Parade



Runners!



Parade - Drumline with Lights



Parade from Ace Hotel Room 01



Parade from Ace Hotel Room 02