Super Crunchy Portland

We had a wonderful time in Portland—it was an absolutely beautiful city. It was a bit like Boston, but less expensive....lots of interesting neighborhoods, markets, liberal people--no Bush/Cheney bumper stickers out here! It's also a bit of a throw-back to the 60's. They have tons of hippies- young and old ones. It's like Haight Ashbury in the 60's where everyone got the message to congregate in San Francisco. They've just moved north to Portland for the millennium. We couldn’t remember the last time we saw dred locks and tye-dyed t-shirts--for real, not as a fashion statement!! And, they do love their coffee (espressos, lattes,etc). There's a drive-thru espresso stand every few miles (kind of like the drive-thru daiquiris in Louisiana).
We walked through Old Town and Chinatown to visit the Saturday Market (which actually runs every weekend- on Saturday and Sunday. It was filled with vendors selling New Age crystals, tie-dyed shirts, wooden toys and an international food bazaar with the most amazing food. We spent two days and two lunches (the best gyros ever) there.
The neighborhoods were interesting- from the upscale (Newbury Street-esque) Pearl District to the Hawthorne- hippy-dippy- area. The downtown area is connected via a free trolley system- so access to all the shops and restaurants is easy. They have Powell’s bookstore- which covers an entire city block- and was packed with patrons.
We couldn’t visit Oregon without seeing the Cascades and Mt Hood. So we took a day to drive through the mountains, made a stop at horrifying Timberlake Lodge packed with teenage snowboarders.



The stop at the fish hatchery was fascinating. The salmon ladders were active and we were able to see the fish making their way through the ladders. We learned that salmon have a 2 second memory- so now John has officially declared himself “salmon brained”. We talked with a woman who’s sole job is counting fish. She sits in a small room with a keypad counter and counts the individual fish as they enter the ladder. She has to count them by species and also note any damage on their bodies (on a special counter). And we thought selling training was a horrible job!