I like to keep notes about our travels. Sometimes they are scribbles, sometimes they are more detailed. We went to Portland, Oregon July 18-25.
After an easy flight from Long Beach - easy for being short, but not easy for me because packing makes me panic, and we left our lunch behind in the terminal (fears of low blood sugar and/or starvation) - we arrived in Portland. Jet Blue loaded us up with chips, pretzels and popcorn so I survived the famine. Our first stop (after the Max train downtown, the car rental office and the scary food cart lane where transients watched us closely and then asked for our leftovers) was Powell's City of Books where our two bookworms had the thrill of their lives. Floors and floors of books. We spent an hour or so perusing and then headed out for some amazing donuts at Blue Star: maple bacon, chocolate ganache, creme brulee and Meyer lemon.
That evening we checked in to our Airbnb in Rhododendron - a beautiful cabin with beds for everybody and a creek in the backyard. Everything about it was interesting from the tile work to the collection of antiques. Everywhere we looked was some artifact or crazy knickknack - even on the last day we were finding neat things we hadn't noticed before.
The next day we slept in and then headed toward the Columbia River Gorge. On the way we made a quick stop for some fresh picked blueberries that were fabulous.
Audrey and Claire were already fed up with posing for pictures by this point, so I agreed to take more informal shots. We went to the waterfall loop next and drove by several falls before we stopped at Multnomah. I can't say how amazing the falls were - I could have watched them for hours. Audrey and Claire were impressed and also overcome by the impulse to spit off the bridge.
From Multnomah we headed east and passed up a few more falls before we got out at Horsetail Falls. Another beautiful sight.
After Horsetail Falls we drove the Fruit Loop - a cluster of fruit stands bakeries and wineries on the east side of Mt. Hood. This is exactly my kind of thing. We ended up picking 3 pounds of blueberries and some strawberries, raspberries and blackberries. We also got some delicious cherry and Marion berry hand pies. At one stand we sampled at least a dozen different kinds of jam. We had great barbecue for dinner (cornbread salad was the highlight) and then drove up the mountain to Timberline Lodge. I was tired by then and it was freezing on that mountain, so I didn't appreciate it as much as I should have. The woodworking was gorgeous and we played ping pong on a solid wood ping pong table.
As we drove around the mountain it would disappear and then reappear and we gasped every time we saw it. I wish I could convey how enormous it is.
The next morning it was decided that another day of waterfalls was not desirable (for anybody but me) so we went to Ski Bowl for rock climbing, maze running, trampolines and Alpine slides. It was a really fun day - by the end we were all pushing our limits on the Alpine slide - pretty exciting.
We were starved and ate at the Zig Zag Restaurant near our cabin - pizza, calzones, meatloaf, etc. It was good to have hot food. We went back to our cabin, did a little wandering around the creek, built a fire and had our own hilarious singalong (Mark as audience).
Friday July 21 had us packing up our things and heading back by the Fruit Loop for some more pies and cherries (we still had plenty of blueberries). We ate lunch in Hood River and went to Wahclella Falls. The walk up to the falls was one gorgeous scene after another of rocks and water, trees and mosses. Every step brought another beautiful sight. Claire waded a little on the way up. Once we got to the fall itself, nobody wanted to swim in the basin. The water was coming off the cliff like a train. Audrey and I got as close as we could and stood on the rocks just watching. The mist felt good after a hot hike. I was in awe of the cliffs above me and the giant wall of water pounding down so close to us. I would have been terrified to be any nearer to it than I was.
From Wahclella we started the drive to an Airbnb in Tenino, WA, our accommodations on the way to Seattle. We got in pretty late and our host kindly let us in and gave us fresh eggs from her chickens. It was a sweet gesture quickly undone by the spiders, crumbs and hairy sheets in the apartment. We were all exhausted and managed to sleep anyway. In the morning we drove to Seattle where we toured the Seattle Public Library and Pike Place Market and had some great Thai food.
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| Seattle Public Library |
On Sunday, July 23 we left Tenino for the Oregon Coast. (This is also the day I ate the last of the blueberries. Sad.) It took a few hours to get there, but the drive was pretty the whole way. We drove over the 4-mile Megler Bridge into Astoria where we had lunch at a farmer's market. We met a nice family whose grown daughter was deaf, and they taught us a few words in sign language. From Astoria we went to Ecola State Park for an amazing view of the coast. The forest on the drive to the highest point was dense and lush.
One place I was really looking forward to was Cannon Beach and it did not disappoint. We drove from Cannon Beach to the Tillamook Factory with a couple of stops on the way - one at Hug Point and another at an unnamed park to eat our dinner. We had to make do with chips, pb&j and boiled eggs, but we were hungry so it tasted pretty good. At Tillamook, we all had a few cheese samples and some ice cream and then - back to the car.
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| Cannon Beach and photo bomber |
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| Hug Point |
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| Tillamook Factory |
We spent the night at a gorgeous Airbnb in the Alberta neighborhood of Portland. After our first day, I wasn't sure I was a fan of the city, but this area changed my mind. We loved the shops and parks and great food. We had some amazing waffles for breakfast (mine: sauteed mushroom, spinach and red pepper with bacon, herb chevre, and a fried egg) and ate at a place called Gravy for lunch that I am still thinking about (hash browns, biscuits with htwo kinds of gravy, kale salad with citrus dressing). We stopped by Grant Park to see statues of Beverly Cleary characters and drove down Ramona Quimby's Klikitat Street.
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| Marl Sasquatch Sterzick (we made him do this) |
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| Cat taco |
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| Teeter totters! Claire was thrilled |
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| Peninsula Park |
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| Peninsula Park |
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| Culver Park |
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| Culver Park |
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| Culver Park |
Our last night in Portland was spent buying more books at Powells and then doing a little more food tourism getting ice cream at Salt and Straw. (After some people had pizza and other people had roasted Brussels in sweet chili sauce and a nectarine basil shrub. Yum). There were some weird ice cream flavors: strawberry balsamic black pepper (nope); goat cheese Marion berry habanero (okay); and Meyer lemon buttermilk with blueberries (yep!).
We finally had to admit our vacation was over, so turned in our car, took the train to our hotel and crashed out for a few hours of sleep before our 7 am flight.
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