Back to the Northwest

We were up early this morning to catch the Super Shuttle from the Hyatt Regency lobby out to the Phoenix airport. Son-in-law Todd and the kids took the Sky Rail from downtown out to the airport and we all met up going through the security line.

Grandson Micah had tried to take some pictures of the Grand Canyon on the way, but we didn't fly by it on this return trip. He'd taken a couple of pictures on the way down with my iPad, but I thought he might have better luck using Camera+ on my iPhone. He took some neat pictures along the way, then had fun playing with the different effects and borders that are part of that ap.

I think he got a great shot of the Three Sisters --

Looking down as we head towards Portland. I like the "filmstrip" effect.

We had quite a time at the parking garage at the Portland airport. Micah and his sister Havela came with us while the rest got picked up by Daughter Dawn (there were just too many of us for one rig...). I had written down the floor area of the parking place on the parking ticket. Going down the tunnel, we came to a pay station and I put the ticket in without taking another look at the site number (2F). The machine took the parking ticket and gave me a receipt, but then I didn't have the site number.

We got to the Long Term Parking Garage and where I thought the car might be, but couldn't find it. We checked out a couple of other floors and didn't fare any better. Finally, I found a phone and asked for assistance. The lady on the phone very nicely sent a man in a pickup to help us find our vehicle. Fortunately, I have all the information about the car, license plate number, etc. on my iPhone. Turns out we had taken a different elevator and were at the other end of the parking structure!

The Parking guy took Forry to the car, then followed him back to where we were waiting and then led us out of the parking structure -- going the wrong way on many of the ramps with his light flashing. Then when we got to the exit and put the receipt card in the machine, it said it was "blocked!" We had to back out and get ourselves over to the cashier line. He was able to get on the phone and talk to the lady who had first helped us. Never quite figured out what the deal was, except that perhaps there had been too much time between the time we paid for parking and the time we finally left the garage??!

We figured after all of our troubles, by the time we got to Canby, we deserved a stop at Dairy Queen.