Portland: Marathon

As you may have read, Dear Husband accompanied me to Portland, Oregon, for a combination working vacation. After a few days of sightseeing together (e.g. here), I attended an academic conference, while he kept himself occupied in the hotel or around town. On Sunday morning, I played hooky from the conference to watch him run the Portland Marathon, which fortuitously was scheduled for the end of our trip.

Post time was 6:30am, so we woke up early, dressed warmly and scarfed granola bars for breakfast before walking 6 blocks or so from our hotel to the staging area. DH gave me his extra layers and joined the throngs in the chutes at the last possible minute. I watched the Unipiper pedal around on his unicycle wearing a kilt and a Darth Vader helmet, playing his bagpipe and shooting flames. The man is a Portland institution. Keep Portland weird.

By this point the sun had risen, and volunteers had handed out cowbells to spectators. I rang mine while following a map and the crowds to pre-determined spots to catch a glimpse of DH at various mile markers. I wasn't fast enough with my camera to get any snapshots, but perhaps my favorite moment of the race was when I cut through the crowd of runners to cross the street--and got to high-five DH as he ran by me! Then the course swerved out of downtown.

After this a good girlfriend from high school who now lives in the area met me back at the hotel. We went to a food truck for breakfast sandwiches that we ate in the room while catching up. Finally, it was time to walk across the river to see DH at the last check point before the finish line. I accidentally had my camera on selfie mode, which is how I captured DH's favorite pic of the race (left) of me enthusiastically cheering him on.

Then we walked back across the bridge and made our way to the final stretch, where I captured his photo of DH sprinting to the finish line. He made great time, setting a personal best of 4 hours 33 minutes to run 26.2 miles. We ate a bunch of free food in the celebration zone before R.L. kindly drove us to the airport to begin the long journey home. So long, Portland--it's been real!