So ended up going over the past weekend from Friday - Tuesday
Crossed the Border around 845/9am on friday, ended up taking just under 5.5 hours with a gas and food break, about the same on the way back leaving Portland around 11 getting home around 6. Traffic only really slowed through downtown Seattle, other than that it was quite a smooth (albeit super boring) drive.
EDIT* ONE THING I'LL START WITH: Bring your passport with you when going out anywhere with booze etc. Apparently it's law now for anyone from another country to need their Passport as ID for booze, we only got turned down at like 3 of the 20 or so places we went, but 2 of the 3 were places i really wanted to go.
We stayed at the Westin downtown, imo it's perfectly situated for a tourist as it's super central to everything. When the S/O and I go places we usually get the absolute most we can out of a city and mostly on foot, so the positioning of the hotel worked well.
I'll start with the sights
Saturday we walked to washington park on the way to the Japanese gardens, from the hotel it's about a 25 minute walk to the edge of the park and all uphill from there, an easy walk though.
The Japanese gardens were a nice surprise, they are super nice and i was very impressed with them for the $10 admission, Washington park in general is pretty nice and i'm sure it's beautiful in the summer with it's test rose garden etc.
Walking from the park we walked up to Knobb hill and through the pearl district. Knobb hill has some spots that are reminiscent of Yale town, little trendy resturants and bars, we stopped at a few, most are the same with small menus if they serve food at all. Little shops here and there to check out.
A problem i found with portland is that the streets are so small and narrow that it feels almost like you have to walk up and down every street or else you will miss stuff. It's hard enough to kind of keep track where you are and points of interest you've already noted, so in some ways i felt like this is a downside for your average person walking around
on Sunday we drove to Cannon beach, takes about 1.5 hours to drive there from Portland, easy fairly scenic drive. The Cannon beach area in terms of shops and restaurants is really touristy and the two places we ate at (a small coffee shop and Tom's Fish and Chips) were super highly rated on yelp etc but they were quite disapointing.
The beach itself and Haystack rock is kinda cool but for somone who's been up and down the BC coast as well as to Long beach/Tofino/Uculet, etc. it didnt have very much "wow" factor. If you've been to those places i wouldnt say Cannon Beach is a must-see.
Drove through Astoria, didnt feel like getting out but kind of a cool little town.
Dining:
Voodoo Donuts: We wouldnt have gone if there had been a line up, we were ordering in under 5 minutes inside so we got a box of donuts, the peach fritter and "homer" donut were pretty good and super fresh but nothing "Crazy", Cartems donuts locally are better imo.
Little Bird:
little french resty the sister restaurant of Le Pigeon, which we couldnt get into without a reso. It was kinda shitty on my part because i was drinking through the days most days and felt pretty full/gross by the time dinner rolled around. Little bird was awesome though
Started with the Bone Marrow and Tartare, then split the "double brie" burger which we didnt realize meant double patty instead of double brie lol.. really good rare-cooked burger.
The Dessert though, a little french cake with a blackberry compote and Coconut ice cream all made from scratch was crazyyyyy.. one of the best desserts i've ever had.
Screen Door:
Arrived just before 10 AM monday morning, no wait and we were seated within 5 minutes, kind of a cool little spot, nice ambiance and attentive servers.
The menu has a lot for somone like me lol.. but I had to go with the Chicken and Waffles obviously.. ordered the two peice chicken.. i knew i should have just got the single peice.. I know some people must order it to share but i saw a lot of people there ordering the 2 or 3 peice and eat the whole thing.. dunno how the hell they do it lol.. Merica!
the chicken was killer and some of the best fried chicken i've had considering they were both breasts.. incredibly juice and the fry was super tasty..
wifey had the Huevo's rancheros which had authentic mexican flavour and was very good as well.
I ordered a side of the fresh made biscuits cause they looked so good and my eyes didnt deceive me, If i went again i'd 100% get the breakfast sandwhiches made on the biscuits.
Pok Pok:
Showed up around 430 on monday evening, no wait but took 10 to get seated, it's a very small place so no wonder the wait is always so long. Ordered the spicey wings, one of the daily specials with prawns, bamboo shoots, and then a beef dish.
Wings were pretty salty but i can see the appeal, i think the recipe, although may not be authentic as it is now, could be tweaked and greatly improved rather than that heavy fish sauce. Wings were still probably the highlight of the meal, the special dish in the middle of the picture was good but the beef dish was pretty flavourless.. overall the whole meal was alright, i 100% would not wait more than 10 minutes to get in.
Tried to get into a few other places including the Whiskey Library and Platform or whatever it's called the sushi place on the 18th floor of a hotel, both were full.
Went to 10+ brewiers and tasting rooms, Deschutes stood out just because it's similar to CRAFT, but i'd definately prefer CRAFT overall. In all honesty there was not a single brewery that stood out to me.. I prefer at LEAST 3 breweries locally over any single one i tried in Portland..
Tasting rooms and stuff are nice compared to here though because you arent limited to having only a taster etc. you can drink your ass off in places that serve no food lol..
For Beer stores and anyone looking to waste an hour, the only spot you need to go to is John's Market place:
the craziest beer store i've ever been into, We went to Beer mongers and a few others i had wanted to check out, the others were a waste of time compared to Johns marketplace, it's about a 15 minute drive South of downtown just off the I5, but well worth it if your looking to bring back beer.. no joke they probably had the equivelent of 15 of those racks throughout the store filled with all different beers.
We also drove the hour to the woodburn outlets, essentially an identicle copy of the Seattle Premium outlets in terms of stores. IMO there were basically no deals, even without sales tax the prices on similar items here in Van were cheaper.. only thing i bought was a $12 pair of Levi's.
All the resturants, beer stores, and parks etc we walked to easilly.. so if you look at those locations on a map you can see while it looks like a decent distance, it's not bad in good weather. An Example would be that it took approx 45 minutes to walk from the Westin to ScreenDoor.
overall i'm glad we checked it out, definately a different vibe for an american city, cool in that there are a million bars and resturants to stop in at whenever you want.
The city itself is cleaner than most i've been to in the states but the Homeless problem is super apparent and i'd say far more visible than in Vancouver, Tent Cities all over the place, homeless sprawled out on sidewalks, most of the cities parks have at least a few sleeping bags and tents layed out in them..
Probably wouldnt go back again as a get-away just because we felt we saw what we wanted to and did most there was to do.. also it's not exactly cheap and for what we spent in total we could have probably went and laid on a beach for a week somewhere lol, oh well, nice to see new places
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