Our Airbnb hosts love auctions and attend them regularly. They buy and sell, keep, and gift all kinds of things they find at auctions, including cars which they transform into batmobiles (well, they’ve only done this once.)
For a couple of weeks they have invited us to come with them to one of these auctions. Yesterday, we finally went with them to the Estate Sales Unlimited Friday night auction in Hillsboro, Oregon (about 14 miles from Portland.) Apparently, this auction is one of the priciest ones with a minimum bid of $10 dollars and a start bid of $50 which starts going down if no one bids.
On the way, we stopped by McDonalds for a quick dinner before the auction and we all agreed that it was the nicest McDonalds we had ever been to. The colors were tamed down, nice pastels, nice lighting, a big TV in the middle, a very high tech menu. You would never know you are at a McDonalds if the signage and menu were removed.
The auction started at 6:30pm, we arrived around 6pm for the preview of items. When we parked and got out of the car, a strong pine smell came flying into our noses; it was wonderful, it smelled like winter wonderland. I was looking around for a bunch of pine trees but didn’t see any. I loved the smell so much, I was sniffing like a K-9 looking for cocaine. Then we headed inside.
They had all kinds of stuff.
One of my favorite things were the amazing dollhouses full of furniture and other details which ended selling for $125 and $170.
Josh and I had a little fun with them too.
Josh’s favorite were the vintage tools. He even bid on them but the price for the box went too high for him. They sold for $60.
Another thing we thought was super cool was the vintage eye vision test tool. You look through the hole and slide the other end piece up and down the scale until you can read the smallest line of type. The number on the scale marked by the end piece is the lens you require.
I actually loved this silly Halloween mug. It was well made glazed ceramic with a dangling pumpkin at the bottom of the handle and it was big, maybe 20oz. I would’ve totally maybe bought it if it was individually for sale.
After looking around, Josh sat down on a chair and chatted with the man next to him until the auction started. We later found out that apparently this man is a legend around here. He has been coming for years and even has his own reserved parking spot and reserved front seat during the auction.
The owners of the auction center have two dogs, so they allow dogs during the auction.
We didn’t stay till the end and we left the auction empty handed (we are in the US temporarily after all). Overall it was an interesting experience.
A New Life Wandering 