It’s been a while since my last post which is mostly due to the fact that a lot was going on in my life recently. Jessie and I got married, we had friends and family over, and we spent our “double honeymoon” together with Marc and Ines. That was a while ago but now I finally found some time to write about it.

We started our trip with a flight into LA and we directly drove to the beach - specifically Venice Beach - where our small apartment was.

Two weeks ago, I was able to check off “the South” from my list of things to see in the US. A business trip brought me to Austin, TX and I decided to stay and spend the weekend.

The weather was a welcome change from the Michigan winter. During the day, temperatures rose to 86F and on the second day, I bought sunscreen.

I noticed that the city had birds that I’ve neither seen in Germany nor in Michigan. Some of them sounded very strange and I saw these two fellas here that I hope didn’t escape someone’s home.

I thought I’d give an update on the current status of my bike restauration. I’m at a point where I’m considering to just call it done.

I’ve been wondering if I should really make the conversion from 27" to 700c wheels since that would significantly increase the price with new brakes, spokes, and rims.

Therefore, I decided to initially just keep the steel rims which also look pretty darn cool when they are clean. Instead, I invested in some presumably very good brake pads that should improve stopping performance. At least in dry conditions, I now think the performance is pretty good. In rainy weather, however, I’m definitely seeing what others have mentioned online: It takes a couple of seconds for the water to be pushed away before braking actually starts. Since this’ll likely be a good weather bike, I’m okay with that for now.

One of my best ideas in Portland must’ve been to explore the nature outside of the city. On Thursday, I drove about an hour further inland to go hiking on the Eagle Creek Trail which promised beautiful landscape and a ton of waterfalls.

As most trails that I’ve seen so far in the U.S., this one started with a parking lot, restrooms and some nice and helpful overview information. Admission was $5 and you were able to pay at the self service station.

During my trip to Portland, I rented a car to explore the surrounding area. One trip that I decided to make was to the Pacific Coast.

At the car rental, I had the option to choose between an older VW Passat and a brand new Chevy Cruze. Also, the Chevy came with a rear-view camera and the Passat was parked all the way in the back and they would’ve had to move vehicles around. So I took the Cruze and it actually is a pretty good car. The transmission shifted funky sometimes and the suspension felt a bit strange but it had CarPlay and a very good gas mileage. I looked up the price later and for that money I’d still rather get a Golf but hey - not as bad as expected.

I had some vacation days left over and figured I’d rather use them before the weather gets miserable. But where to? After looking at the cities in the U.S. that I hadn’t been to yet and the weather to be anticipated there my choice was clear: The hipster capital Portland. After booking the flight, Jessie introduced me to the amazing show Portlandia which is a satire of the whole city and hipster culture. During my trip, I wanted to find out how much of that is really true.

Last weekend, we visited Grand Rapids. That was the first time I’ve been to the city and I hope it’s not the last time. We came for the Art Prize festival where local and national artists show their pieces throughout the whole city and you can just wander around and look at them. This one here was right in the front yard of the bed & breakfast that we stayed at.

It looks like it is slowly getting colder outside and so I thought I’d need a project to work on for the colder and darker days. Also, since you can barely get along in life with two bikes, a third one would be nice.

I wanted to find a cheap but decent old bike and then put some work into restoring it and then use it as a town bike or to commute to work when back in Germany. On craigslist, I found an old Nishiki Sport from 1980 for $70. It was in pretty good condition and even came with some nail polish that the seller had bought to fix some of the chips on the frame with but never did. I thought I couldn’t really go wrong for that price and just bought it.

On Labor Day weekend, Jessie and I went on a short trip “up north” to the Hoeft State Park. We went up on Friday morning and back on Monday morning as early as we could to beat traffic.

On our way, we noticed a scary amount of Trump-supporting signs. In the upper parts of Michigan, they certainly are ubiquitous. In metro Detroit, I haven’t seen a single one in quite some time now. Thankfully, it’s mostly the metro area that is deciding the vote.

This weekend, Jimmy and I went on a two day hike on the Potawatomi Trail in the Pinckney state recreation area, which is about an hour away from home.

The hike started during nice weather but light rain was promised for the rest of the day. Soon after we started hiking, the rain started and turned into pretty severe rain. At that point, it was too late to turn back and we just went on - on trails that had become small rivers. There were many frogs around, such as this one here, that clearly enjoyed the rain more than we did.