2009 Portland Vancouver Bridges and Rivers Calendar

We were very excited to be featured as an event of monthly interest in the 2009 Portland-Vancouver Bridges and Rivers Calendar. Proceeds from the sale of these calendars will help fund the Portland bridge centennial celebrations, beginning in 2010.

The Willamette Week featured Bohemian Storytelling Tours in its Words Listing on August 28th, 2008:

It's that age-old conundrum: You're sick of that same iPod playlist you've been lugging along for your walks around town, but you're too media-addicted to even think about trekking sans soundtrack. Bohemian Storytelling tours might have the cure for what ails you. On the last Sunday of every month (if it isn't raining) Nathan Hoover and Jay Twenge deliver a two-hour, performance-art walking tour around downtown Portland. The current theme is "Deep Water," a music-and-poetry meditation on humanity's relationship to H2O. If Sunday night doesn't work for you, the duo is open to scheduling group tours at other times. Who knows—with the newfound appreciation for the environment that they're hoping to impart, maybe the next time you go for a stroll you won't mind leaving those little white headphones at home.

The Oregonian featured Bohemian Storytelling Tours in its A&E section on Friday, April 27th, 2007:

If it's 6 p.m. on a Sunday -- and it's not raining -- head down to Tom McCall Waterfront Park, next to the Steel Bridge approach, where you'll find Nathan Hoover and Jay Twenge passing out fliers, inviting the curious to follow the two of them on a very untraditional walking tour. Every week, they wait by the river to see who might show up: Hoover, 26, with a walking stick in hand; Twenge, 31, with an electric guitar slung over his shoulder, portable Marshall amplifiers hanging from his belt. As joggers and bicyclists blew past, and fishermen drifted down the Willamette one recent Sunday, Hoover, who has a background in improvisational theater, tried to explain the genesis for these weekly walks, which he has dubbed "Bohemian Storytelling Tours." He had spent a lot of time playing with the idea of theater that didn't require a performance or rehearsal space and didn't require a cast. At the same time, he also was very interested in "getting people to think about their surroundings," inspiring them to look at "the stuff you pass by every day" and see it in a new way. What if he were to use the city, its river and its bridges, as a kind of living theater set? How would that add to people's understanding of their city -- of themselves? And so to call these Sunday evening experiments "walking tours" seems a little imprecise. In reality, the tours, which launched last October, feel more like taking a one-mile jaunt around the waterfront with an actor who stops regularly to recite poetry, perform dramatic excerpts and offer historical ruminations and scientific observations -- all while a musician provides a suitable live soundtrack. It's all very earnest, carefully planned out, deeply felt. Writers Billy Collins and David Foster Wallace are evoked. Hoover, who wears a microphone, carries a thick stack of notes in his pocket, carefully organized, highlighted, annotated, which he whips out only occasionally, if he fears he may not get a fact just right. Mostly it's all from memory. At one point, he puts so much emotion into one of his monologues that sweat pours off his brow, and a few drops roll down his nose. The current walks are organized around the theme "Deep Water," and once Hoover and Twenge were satisfied they'd picked up all the walkers they could for this particular Sunday, our little group made its way from the waterfront across the Steel Bridge's lower deck, over to the east bank of the river, across the railroad tracks, then west on the Steel Bridge's upper deck, back toward the waterfront. Along the way there was talk of how long it takes a raindrop to fall to the earth, a poetic description of the 1996 floods that threatened the city. There was also talk of the ways we make our lives around water: the history and architecture of Portland's bridges, a discussion of Pratt trusses, and a question from Hoover: "Can a river be held captive by its bridges?" At one point, on the east side of the river, Hoover stopped and instructed the group to sit at the top of some stairs, as he stood at the bottom, the river and the city stretched out behind him -- a beautiful makeshift amphitheater. Then he launched into an excerpt from Rudyard Kipling's "The Bridge Builders": "They turned and looked and wondered afresh at the deep water." At times the roar of the passing trains competed with the amplifiers around Twenge's belt. ("Jay, will you give me a little juice, " Hoover said. ) In just a little while Hoover would have to report to work, manning the night desk at a hotel near Lloyd Center. But for now, he was somewhere else entirely. And so were we.

The Willamette Week featured Bohemian Storytelling Tours in its Outdoors Listings on April 25th, 2007:

Started last October by Nathan Hoover and Jay Twenge, these historical walking tours—billed as "site-specific street theater"—should give the Portland Walking Tours a run (er, walk) for their money. These 1.2-mile strolls consist of local history, poetry, live music and theater. The current theme is "Deep Water," where questions like "Is a river held captive by its bridges?" are pondered. Where's Sharon Wood Wortman when you need her? Ironically, walks are cancelled in case of heavy rain.