Getting to Portland (via Frankfurt) turned out to be no problem. But getting though Portland and to the reserved hotel was a bit problematic. Apparently there was a jam of MAX light rail trains, and we had to wait for quite some time before the journey could continue.
Then I decided to get off at Beaverton station. My assumptions was that at such a terminal, there would certainly be some cabs nearby. However, there weren't. Maybe I forgot that this is the U.S. and public transportation is not like what I'm used to.,
Anyway, I switched to the bus.
However, i went the wrong way. My destination was close to 158th Avenue, but the bus went to 185th Avenue. As it was getting late already, I decided not to go back by bus to Beaverton, but rather walk from 185th to 158th Avenue. Despite the hot sun (27 centigrade in the shade), my backpack and the suitcase, this was only a 40 minutes walk. This reminded me to hiking in southern France with the boyscouts ;)
Well, the hotel did not yet cancel my reservation, and after a cool shower and checking my email I went to sleep. Due to the jetlag I was awake at 3:30am. Not too bad, considering a 9 hour time shift.
Let's hope the trip from the hotel to the conference venue will be less complicated ;)