Day 19 - Portland

Woke up and packed everything into the car for the last time, as today I will be moving to my hotel for the rest of my stay in the USA.

After having some breakfast I drove to the laundromat to wash my clothes. After this I will not have to do it again until I get home from the trip. Cost was 1 dollar for the detergent, 2 dollars for the washing machine and 75 cents for the dryer. So just under $5 in Aussie money. Took about 45 minutes to do the complete cycle and fold everything and then I drove around Portland for a while before pulling up at Base Camp Brewery.

It was a little before 12 noon and the place was not open so I had to wait a while to get in. I had gone to this brewery particularly because they have beer in aluminium bottles. (aluminum to the Americans) They had three bottles at the moment so I was able to get one of each and also some coasters.

The brewery looks real nice and offers many different styles of beer on tap.

Leaving there I went to visit the old factory site of the Continental Can Company. CCC used to be one of the two major can suppliers to the breweries in the USA to can their beers.

I have a collection of their inhouse promotional cans and other advertising and also have documented a list of over 250 different locations where they had plants in the USA.

The company went bad in the 1980s and sold off its different divisions to various companies. The plant here in Portland was taken over by the Crown Cork and Seal and is now disused factory. The faded sign for Crown Cork & Seal is still outside the front of the property.

I looked throught the windows of the offices but they were all stripped bare and then went to the side of the property and took some photos of the plant.

Whilst doing that I noticed a sign half hidden behind trees near the gates tied to a chain wire fence. The sign was about parking for the CCC employees. It was held onto the fence with some thin wire that was very rusted. The sign had possibly been there for at least 40 years.

I was able to break the wires on the sign and gained a very unusual addition to my collection.

From there I went to a Walmart store to get some food for the room for the next week and then went to the Red Lion Inn On the River at Jantzen Beach. It is a four storey hotel that is well spread out over a long area beside the Columbia River.

After getting everything into the room I went and took the rental car back to the rental company and got their shuttle bus to the airport. From there I rang the Red Lion and arranged for their shuttle bus to come pick me up and go back to the hotel.

Whlst waiting for it to arrive one of the other Australian collectors going to the show, Ray Everingham, arived at the shuttle area. We talked for a while waiting for the shuttle to arrive and in the end I went back inside and rang them to confirm that they were coming. It still took about another 20 minutes for it to come. The quickest way back to the hotel is to go across the river into Washington State and along the riverbank before coming back over another bridge and onto the hotel property.

Ray checked in at the reception and put his bags into his room and we went to the bar and ordered some dinner. While we were sitting thre another Aussie Bruce Tainton arrived and sat and we talked about our travels and journeys to get here.

By the time we finnished talking it was time for bed so I said goodnght to them and went back to my room and slept.