An End of an Era?

It’s been exactly one year since we set off on our nomadic adventures. That year has seen a lot of fun and crazy times: Sunday lunches with families in Italy, the fantastic seafood market in Catania, Sicily, Thanksgiving in an Airbnb, Christmas in Tuscany, months in Mexico, PANAMA!, the Pacific Northwest, and two months in sunny Aruba.

But all good things must eventually either end or be put on hiatus, and so it falls to us to tell you that after much searching, we have found a house that we’re in the process of buying. You might remember that we fell in love with the floating homes in Portland, Oregon. You might also remember that Nancy flew from Los Angeles to Portland last June to look at one floating home and then she flew from Aruba to Portland in July to look at another…neither met our expectations. Then, a few days ago, John was looking at a floating home website (yes, there are such websites) and came across a home that was on the market for only a day.

The house was designed by an architect for himself and his wife back in 2010. When his wife became ill, he sold it. The couple who moved in lived there for nine years before the husband passed away unexpectedly. The wife didn’t want to remain, and the sons decided to sell it. We were lucky enough to be one of the first to see the listing.

When we were in Portland earlier this year, we met a real estate agent who we liked. So, we called her and she’s working with us. The sellers (the two sons of the owners) represent a family trust. Plus, they are both busy with their own families and careers. We tell you this because the house has not been emptied. The only things that are gone are the mother’s clothing. Last Sunday John flew out to look at the place and he and the agent walked through the house. Every drawer and closet have things in it. We noticed one closet that had family photo albums and 35mm slides. Oh yea, besides the house we have a garage. You might wonder where a floating home has a garage. Well, the marina is gated and as you drive in there are garages situated about 50 yards from the ramps that lead to the homes. This marina only has 19 homes. Each homeowner gets a two-car garage, except for us. For some reason unknown to us, we have a four-car garage with rooms above that have skylights. When we opened the first garage door there was even a bright shiny new Jeep parked inside.

I don't think we'll get to keep the Jeep. Settlement is scheduled for October 18th, and we’ve allowed the sellers until November 1st to clean out the house and garage. We’ll move in after the 1st.

Check out this link to see a video walkthrough of the house.

So... we can’t say that we’re “pure nomads” any longer, but we plan to still travel the world as soon as we settle in…we’ll get itchy to go somewhere. As a matter of fact, before seeing this listing we had purchased airline tickets to Barcelona. Our plan was to drive from Barcelona to Porto, Portugal, take a wine cruise down the Douro River, go the Nazare where in October and November surfers try to surf the 100’ waves.

If you have HBO (now know as MAX HBO) there's a documentary series about the surfers. Its crazy.

We had it all planned and then came the house. The best laid plans of mice and men!

We’ll keep the blog site up and running… you never know we might find interesting things to do in Portland that might be worth talking about. But our posts probably won’t come out as often as they have during the past year.

Before we sign off. Much of the furniture of our new house is being left for us. We asked if pieces were available and were told yes. So, many pieces of our furniture, which is in storage in Philadelphia, isn't needed. We've been able to find homes for almost all of them except for our beautiful glass dining room table. This table has two glass leaves that are built into the glass and metal body of the table. The leaves extend asllowing six people to sit at the table. We're selling it on Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist for $500. But, if anyone reading this would like it, we'll sell it for $250. It's 10mm tempered glass, it weighs 311 lbs., and it's dimensions ae 24.8" x 5' x .39".

If anyone knows of someone who needs a brand new table (we had it in our Rittenhouse Sq. apartment for 13 months.) just send John or Nancy and email or text. It's gotta be picked up at the Public Storage facility at South Swanson Rd. Philadelphia. (it's a big road, no going down crazy S. Philly side streets. [johnzuchero@gmail.com or 610-906-5513] OR [ms.nancyhayes@gmail.com or 856-981-8296]

And so, thanks for being interested in our travels and we hope you all have had fun reading about our adventures. So maybe that’s not all, folks!

John and Nancy Keeping Portland Weird