Portland, OR

We got into Portland around 4 or 5pm and we got a hold of Katie’s sister Jessica so we headed over to her apartment. Jessica was going to show us around Portland. Once again we got lucky and the street right next to her apartment building was open and free parking so we could park the truck and trailer no problem. We walked to the main street of her neighborhood to grab a drink and plan out the next couple days so we could get a good feel for Portland. I forgot to mention but it was really cool when we were driving South into Portland, it is the town of bridges. There is a river (cannot remember the name) that goes right through the middle of Portland, so there are a lot of bridges that let you go back and forth between the two sides of the city, really cool. Anyway we grabbed some beer at a local place in Jessica’s neighborhood and talked about Portland and planned out what we should see. We went back to Jessica’s and BBQ’d some hamburgers and got ready to paint the town the next day. We had decided that we wanted to check out the Japanese gardens and the famous Powell’s bookstore the next day. So we woke up had some coffee and headed down to the bus stop, Portland has really good public transportation. We hopped on a bus and then took the MAX (their above ground subway train) over to the Japanese gardens. We walked up this steep hill to the entrance of the gardens. The Japanese gardens were incredible, so beautifully maintained. I took a TON of photos here, I was completely in my element. We spent a good couple hours milling around the gardens. We then grabbed another bus downtown and stopped and had lunch at Deschutes Brewery, Joe and I both got the beer sampler where we got to chose six beers to taste. They all were really good, Joe got more of the darker beers, and I tried more reds and pale ales. After lunch we headed over to the famous Powell’s bookstore, it is so big that they give you a map to figure your way around. We spent a good couple hours in here as well. All in all a really good day, on the bus ride home we decided to check out the Portland Art Museum the next day because they had a special MC Esher exhibit going on.
The next day we once again hopped on a bus and went downtown. We went and checked out the Portland Art museum and the special MC Esher exhibit. The MC Esher exhibit was totally worth it, even if there was no other art to see that would have been enough for me, it was really cool. It is so amazing how he made the metamorphosis drawings, and did you know most of his works he carved into wood and then stamped onto paper?!? He was an incredible artist. After the museum we went down to a section of downtown where they have a bunch of food carts and you could get any kind of food you want. Joe had Vietnamese, Jessica had Korean BBQ, and I, of course, had Mexican. All of our dishes were really good, and really super cheap! We headed back to Jessica’s for one more night before we headed onto the Oregon coast. Joe decided to hang out back at Decca’s apartment while I went with her to a friends BBQ. Now this was an interesting experience… let’s just say that I met some really curious people. There were hippies, weirdos, and just interesting folk at this BBQ. It made me sit back and think of how many different kinds of people there are out there and how people come together and converse. Joe and I did sort of conclude that Portland people are exclusive and very proud to live or be from Portland, that moving from another place it might be hard to break into the scene… something to think about when figuring where we want to move.