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Holiday Activities and Lights Lots of Lights

Nik

Well-Known Member
Since moving to Portland I have enjoyed lots of the fun things that constantly seem to be going on here. Seriously every weekend there is another fun event. The book festival is still my favorite but in very close second would have to be BrewLights at the Oregon Zoo.

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Every year for the holidays Oregon Zoo does a huge Christmas Light display and you can buy special tickets to go see it at night after zoo hours. But just two days out of the year they allow only people 21 and up to see the lights in the event called "BrewLights" during those nights there are over 40 breweries invited to the zoo and with your ticket you get 20 tasting tickets so you can go sample the drinks.

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It was an absolutely fabulous time wandering the zoo, looking at animals, looking at the lights, sampling ciders and beers and wines and even flavored vodka. There was also live music, three different bands that I saw and a dj.

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We rode the train of course. Which puffed actual steam and was also covered in lights.
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But, certainly one highlight of the night had to be near the end. We had gone through many of our tastings and in a search for a restroom discovered the indoor portion of the elephant enclosure (the elephants have a massive area with multiple outdoor areas, a swimming pool and a huge indoor enclosure as well). So we wandered on into the elephant "house", found the desired restrooms and decided to sit in the stadium sitting and watch the elephants while we drank our latest samples. There were several others who had the same idea but it wasn't overly crowded just well populated.

As we are sipping our drinks Sean says "Do you think those two elephants are being romantic? That one keeps rubbing the others back." I look and as we are watching it becomes quite obvious that the elephant rubbing the other with his trunk is getting super excited. Suddenly it looks like he has a fifth leg. The female starts to seem annoyed and walks away. And he follows her around continuously tapping her with his trunk, rubbing her with his trunk and she continues to walk away from him.

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At one point he even mounted her. The other people in the room start cheering for him. Then she kind of just looks back at him like "ya right" and walks away. And all the cheers in the room turned to "awww" in sympathy with the rejected male. A drunk guy behind us kept telling his buddies "That was totally how my last date went".
 

Nik

Well-Known Member
I have a few more photos of the rejected elephant in continuation with the story...

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This was the point where the crowd started cheering only to be disappointed as the female once again walked away and rejected the male.

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Overall I would say it was a highly entertaining evening. And I discovered several new beers that I absolutely found delicious... There was a smores stout and a salted carmel porter that were to die for.
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Yes that is me taking advantage of the tunnel that is meant to allow children to feel like part of the exhibit. Hey I'm child sized and I fit so in I went!
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Boxergirl

Well-Known Member
Wow! That sounds like so much fun! How many people get to see the elephant encounter - or near encounter - that you did? I love all your pictures. I also really love your purse. I'm a Patricia Nash fan. If I'm going to splurge on something it's going to by Patricia Nash, Frye, or handmade boots. The salted caramel beer sounds amazing! So .... what was the book festival? I'd love to go to a book festival.
 

Nik

Well-Known Member
Wow! That sounds like so much fun! How many people get to see the elephant encounter - or near encounter - that you did? I love all your pictures. I also really love your purse. I'm a Patricia Nash fan. If I'm going to splurge on something it's going to by Patricia Nash, Frye, or handmade boots. The salted caramel beer sounds amazing! So .... what was the book festival? I'd love to go to a book festival.

Oh my goodness the book festival was like my most happiest dream come true.

I heard about it last minute and grabbed tickets last minute so I didn't get to go to any of the classes or to the Tom Hanks talk (yes Tom Hanks was there and he did a talk). Basically all of the downtown museums and also an old cathedral were used for the festival. I think it was either 5 or 6 buildings in total that were used for the book festival. The art museum which was several stories tall was the book fair... floors and floors of books for sale. Authors were there to sign books when you purchased and tons of booths with editors, publishers, authors, some of the local book stores, etc. In the other buildings there were talks and sessions going on all day. So you could go and watch a talk with a panel of three authors or so. Because I did it last minute I didn't do any planning as I should have but I did get to see a couple of the panels and they were awesome. I was not aware that one of my favorite authors happened to be there doing a panel during one of the panels I randomly chose to go watch. But, this is also a yearly thing here in Portland so next year I will buy tickets way in advance and plan out my whole day.

I stayed at the book festival the entire day. Almost from opening until almost closing. I came home with bags of new books, many of which were signed. I chatted with authors and editors and publishers and some of the authors even just gave me their books for free which is apparently against the rules so they asked me not to tell anyone they had done it. But, how cool is that?

There were gourmet food trucks outside as well. I got lucky. I saw the pips donut truck and I had heard they were amazing. So I got in the considerable line. and when there were just three people in front of me they announced "We are about to run out of dough so the next two people in line are it." I was like "Oh no I'm third in line!" But then the person directly in front of me was like "Oh no. Actually I'm with the person in front of me so you are the last person to get some!" And yes the Pips donuts were as good as everyone says they are. And because I was last they just used all the dough left on me so I got a double order for the price of one order. Which was awesome! Pips are tiny little donuts and an order comes with five. So basically five bites in an order. But because i was last I got ten!

Also the book festival more than anything convinced me I absolutely belong here. Any city that does something that huge for literature is where I belong.
 

Boxergirl

Well-Known Member
Oh my gosh! I need to move! That sounds like a dream come true. Please post about it when you go next year. I'm excited on your behalf and just a little jealous.
 

Pastor Dave

Well-Known Member
The Indian elephants, known for their romantic tendencies, have the smaller ears. African elephants, the big boys, have big ears....interestingly shaped exactly like the continent of Africa. Each ear contains 1000's of miles of blood vessels used for cooling the body of the elephant, like a radiator. Nice pics, Nikki.