I walked 10+miles around Eugene no wonder my feet hurt.
Saturday
We slept well enough, considering the trains coming through the neighborhood shook our little apartment windows. Breakfast was made and Leah headed off to her class. Aron and I explored Eugene on foot. He introduced me to Sweet Life and we wandered over to the Saturday Market
First it was the farmers market with a wild array of mushrooms. (Considering the similarity of our weather I’m surprised we don’t see more mushrooms at our Farmers Markets) We sampled sweet strawberries and oggled the produce. Farm fresh tomatoes in June, wonder how they managed that? Greenhouse maybe?
We wandered over to the craft stalls where I fell in love with a tea cup sold by Amy the Potter, and jewelry done by forged.

(the teacup is on the upper shelf, it has a filter basket and a little lid on top to keep the heat in. the lid then comes off, flips over and holds the filter basket when your tea is done steeping. Too cool I say!)
We wandered back over to the Gathering for a while and met up with Leah. We stopped at Sweet Life for more coffee. Sweet Life is a bakery/coffeeshop with a fabulous array of sweets, good coffee and friedly employees.Leah and Aron split a muffin and cinnamon roll, I sustained myself with coffee.

After breakfast we stopped at the hostel running into Aron’s friend Matt, the second of his Eugene friends I had the pleasure to meet. From there Aron and Leah headed out to a party , dropping me back of in Downtown Eugene at the Library.
I wandered around the area, checking out the library, using the wifi, finding an atm and then getting some cash out. My goals were to look for a decent bookstore, a yarn shop, and something for late lunch /snack.
The first bookstore I went into was A Novel Exchange.A small used bookshop with a nice variety of casual reading. It was comfortable and the owners was a doll. Trista chatted me with a bit as I asked about karaoke and other coffee shops in the area. She gave me a couple of suggestions and was a doll, even though I didn’t buy anything.
The next bookshop was Smith Family Books. Trista had pointed it out and it was a short walk from the library. I wandered about, but after tumbling a shelf full of Debbie Macomber novels onto my head I deciced the prices on their used books just weren’t good enough and left.
The bookstore score came from StVincent Depaul “Books and Botique” I was apprehensive on this one. The St Vincent DePaul thrift stores in Seattle never really struck me as great places and to go there for books? Isn’t that odd? In the end though they had great prices and a quite nice selection. I came home with two Maeve Binchy books and a handful of Harlequin candy bar novels. You know, the kind that you enjoy like a candy bar. A small inconsiquential distraction that in the end may not be that good for you and you feel a little guilty about.
I wandered around 5th Ave Station, stopped in at Provisions again, thinking I might pick something up to take back to the hostel for dinner. In the end, I decided they were just too pricey and I could go to Pasta and Co in Seattle just as easily. (We had wandered around 5th Ave station on Friday, I got ice cream from Provisions and some candy from the Candy Baron. It’s a little like UVillage but smaller, food court , fancy shops including a nice embroidery shop and a kitchen supplies store. )
From there I walked back over towards Sweet Life, deciding to stop for a late lunch at a place near there, Laughing Planet.Laughing Planet is an Oregon chain of fresh fusion mexican food. It was tasty and well priced. I popped back over to sweet life for coffee, a sweet (finally) and some time to write.

See I had been in Sweet Life three times by this point, but only once did I avail myself of the charms of its sweets. I chose a chocolate orange pots du creme, which turned out to be overly rich, overly sweet, and just too much. The coffee was good though, and I value knowing a great coffee shop with tasty things.
At this point I was done. It may not seem like much but it was 10 miles of walking and I was tired. I headed back to the hostel curled up on the couch with Oceans Eleven and read a crappy romance novel. Leah and Aron were out at a friends and I was left with this quiet indulgence. Leah messaged me a couple of times to see if I wanted to join them and their “scrumpy” drinking. But I was content
About 8:45 I decided I was peckish and wandered back out looking for something to eat. The fish and chips place was closed so I stopped at the Red apple market for a little deli salad anc chicken strips. (Groceries were cheaper in Eugene, that whole cost of living thing)
Aron and Leah rejoined me around 11, and that was the end of our Saturday in Eugene.
Filed under: Uncategorized on June 25th, 2009 | No Comments »