Frommer's top 10 Portland experiences

While in Seattle, Laurie and I printed out some of the recommended walking tours from Frommers. We only did one, which was in the Fremont District, and I have to say it was kind of iffy. Mediocre, although one shop that they recommended was pretty sweet. Anyhow, we discussed that we should do the walking tours of Portland and see how they rate. But I stumbled upon this list of Frommer's favorite Portland experiences and I wanted to ask my blog partner, Laurie (where you at by the way, are we getting John Mayer/Ben Folds tickets?) (Yes, let's get tickets. Have they gone on sale yet?) (oh you know it, let my people call your people) how many of the things on this list she has done. And of course I'll tell you if I have too. I think my list of favorite Portland experiences would be different, but my creative intellectual side is on spring break (basically I don't want to hurt my brain trying to develop my own list). By the way people, hop on the bandwagon and tell us your favorite Portland experiences.

Strolling the Grounds at the Japanese Garden. I know we've both done this because we've done it together! BTW, picture is from my personal collection here to the right. I love the Japanese Gardens. I went for the first time last year on my birthday. Loved it so much that I bought a membership on the spot. Unfortunately, I've been only one time since -- when we went on Mother's Day. Maybe I'll try to go next week before my membership ends. By the way, are you still thinking about getting a Portland Art Museum membership? I think that may be my one membership for the coming year.

Beer Sampling at Brewpubs. Not necessarily "beer sampling" but I have drank beers at a few brewpubs. But definitely on my list of things to do is hit up all the beer/brew fests they have in Portland, which ironically, Laurie I believe has been to all of them, and I drink more than her and I haven't been to any of them (at least I think I drink more than her, unless she's a closet wino). Wow...I'm not sure what you've been smoking (or drinking). I don't think I've been to any of the beer fests. I've been to a lot of the festivals on the waterfront -- The Bite, Blues Festival, Cinco de Mayo, Rose Festival -- but I don't think I've even had a beer at one of those. As for brew pubs, probably just Rockbottom, Bridgeport Ale House, and various McMenamin's. CORRECTION: While I will not reveal exactly what I was smoking, I had a moment of clarity when Laurie asked me what I was smoking and I remembered it was a different friend, who seems to drink A LOT more than myself, who has been to all of the brewfests. Irony is now lost.

Kayaking Around Ross Island. No, but this sounds fun! Ditto.

Mountain Biking the Leif Erickson Road. No, I don't own a mountain bike, or any bike for that matter. Me neither. I know Laurie's a bike fan.

Hanging Out at Powell's. Yes, but definitely not as much as I should. I think the answer is obvious.

Free Rides on the Vintage Trolleys. No. Man, those are for tourists. Just kidding, but I've never ridden them.

An Afternoon at the Portland Saturday Market. Yes, but again, I need to go back. A few times, but I haven't gone yet this year. The market just re-opened a few weeks ago. Holla!

Summertime Concerts at the Washington Park Zoo. Nope. Yes, and they're really fun. I saw the Indigo Girls there a few years ago. They don't care if you bring food in, so we packed a picnic. Very cool. Oh snap count me in for picnicing.

First Thursday Art Walk. No again! Damn I'm a slacker. I've only been once -- about two years ago. I'd like to check out Last Thursday on Alberta. Oh yeah, totally on our "to do" list. Do you like that by the way? Please advise.

If your town had an Ikea maybe I'd move there

Except for Renton. Unless we could work out a deal where I lived in the Ikea.

There is a whole bunch of controversy surrounding the new Ikea sign marking the Portland location that is set to open this summer (I have inside information that it could be until Christmas, but as of today the Oregonian says summer, but they might not have the inside info like I do). You're like what up with this sign? Why is Portland all up in Ikea's bidness bothering the bajesus out of it? Well, apparently here's the scoop (courtesy of the Oregonian):

The Ikea sign now rises at Cascade Station, at the intersection of Northeast Airport Way and Interstate 205, in a new calling card that's four times higher and 10 times larger than any new sign allowed elsewhere in the city: 100 feet high with three panels that are each 13 feet by 52 feet.

It's so big it has to have blinking lights so that a jet doesn't plow into it," says City Commissioner Randy Leonard, who oversees city signage but knew nothing of the sign until he drove past it.
"I'm not convinced this is legal," he added. "We have clear public policy. The sign code is rooted in land-use law. There are requirements for public hearings."

Ikea sees it differently

"We came to the dance after the rules were made," said Joseph Roth, public affairs director for Ikea United States. "We made very clear what our store and signage requirements were. And we were told that they would be compatible with Cascade Station."

But the sign regulations governing the Cascade Station Development -- and Ikea -- are dramatically different from those that apply to the rest of the city. The city's "Title 32" code outlines numerous sign requirements throughout the city, many of them specific to particular areas, from the so-called "Broadway Bright Lights District" to Old Town Chinatown. But at Cascade Station both signs and building designs are approved by a four-person committee created under a development agreement negotiated among the city, the Port and Cascade Station's main developer, Trammell Crow.

So that's it in a nut shell. I mean, that's how Ikea rolls, with the big sign and what not. Whatevs, just don't scare them away. Keep scaring Walmart away, I'm behind you on that one. But I long for Ikea after my first 5 hour shopping experience in Renton (Seattle location).

FYI The Portland store will be 280,000-square-feet of Swedish shopping goodness (smaller than the 350,000-square-foot store in Seattle so maybe it will only take me 4 hours to go through it). They started hiring employees last week (of the 400 they project to hire for this area).

Something to leave you with you Portland livers, lovers, and enviers:

Some of Ikea's ideas may go over well in eco-friendly Portland, such as encouraging shoppers and employees to use mass transit and charging for shopping bags to encourage conservation.

You know as soon as they open I'm buying one of those blue shopping bags they sell to bring back everytime.

Those Hipster Know-It-Alls

On more reason I am so sad that I do not have Showtime (trust me I'm working on it). And as promised, another non-Portland tangent. However, I did read this article in the Oregonian, which has to do with Portland. So there you go. This article is talking about Ira Glass on his new TV show version of This American Life:

He's just as unlikely on TV. Pale and thin, with nerd-chic horn-rimmed glasses, the host appears in a dark suit, most often sitting behind a wooden desk that has been set, microphone and all, in the midst of some spectacularly implausible place. Next to a highway. In a field of oil tanks. On a mountainside. His voice is mostly disembodied during the stories themselves, which makes sense since this is where the characters, and the visuals, take center stage.

Yeah, that's why we love him. You can read the full article here.

if your town had a powell's, maybe i'd move there

The first time I came to Portland was part of a 3-week, cross-country road trip with two girlfriends while I was in grad school. We rolled into town, paid too much money to park in a garage downtown, and wandered into Peet's, so that I could get my coffee fix. We had no particular destination in mind, just a vague idea that Portland might be a cool place to check out. So, I told the barista that we were in town just for the day and asked her what we should do in town. She pointed us toward record stores, thrift stores, and Powell's.

Have you been to Powell's? It's an entire city block of books, people. You can pick up a free map of the store when you enter and, until you've been there a few times, you definitely need it. We spent hours exploring the stacks together and splitting up to cover different ground. It's where I bought my first copy of Bitch. (Speaking of which, I just read that they're moving their headquarters to Portland.) We were so overwhelmed and envious of people who lived near this fantastic bookstore.

And now I live here. I sometimes go a month or two without stepping foot in Powell's. When I do, though, I'm reminded of how much I love it and wonder how I stayed away for so long. I hit my regular sections: new arrivals (especially memoirs), cookbooks, and knitting books. That takes a couple of hours. If I have more time than that, I can wander into fiction and cultural studies, but I rarely manage to see anything else. I love it.

As much as I love the walls and walls of books, Powell's has something else: free author readings. Yesterday afternoon, I went to the Frank Warren reading I mentioned the other day. He was funny, engaging, smart, and inspiring. He said something that really resonated with me. Because of PostSecret, he has made his home address public. In fact, it appears on the cover of the first PostSecret book. During the Q&A, someone asked if he had result anything other than secrets as a result of his address being so accessible. He hadn't and stated that people have been respectful of him and the project. He said, "I've trusted humanity and humanity hasn't let me down."
It isn't a very good picture -- partly due to my lackluster photography skills, but also because the room was really crowded. Portland is a town that loves books. Even on one of the first warm days of spring -- a day that wasn't quite sunny but also wasn't rainy -- Portlanders filled the large room where Powell's holds author readings. Standing room only. Books, authors, and book lovers. I love Portland.

Update: I just found a photo of the Powell's appearance on PostSecret. I'm just off frame on the left. See how crowded it was?

challenge

So, Erin, what are you doing tomorrow afternoon? Frank Warren (the PostSecrets guy) will be at Powell's at 2 p.m. Also, I hear the weather is supposed to be good for a tram ride. Please advise.

tangents

First, the tangents:

1. "In my bidness. That's ebonics for in my face and annoying the bejeezus out of me."
2. Hey, Erin. What's up? Did you see that John Mayer and Ben Folds are touring together?
   
3. As Erin mentioned, we recently spent a few days in Seattle. The whole trip sprang from a desperate need to see our beloved Ira Glass. This American Life was touring the US, promoting their new television show (premiering March 22 on Showtime). If you have Showtime, you should check it out. Scratch that. If you have Showtime, you should invite us over. The show looks great. What could have been a miserable failure -- turning a unique, compelling, beloved radio show into a television program -- has turned out to be the thing that makes my no-cable-havin' self actually consider getting Showtime. Seriously. It's that good.
   

We had a lot of fun, even though we learned that we're definitely Portland girls. The Emerald City is fun to visit, but I never once thought, "I could live here," like I do when I visit San Francisco. It's funny because, once upon a time when I was living in Alabama, I really really wanted to move to Seattle. I applied to a graduate program at UW and was truly heartbroken when I didn't get in. As we walked around the Fremont neighborhood, self-proclaimed center of the universe, I kept thinking how glad I was that I had landed in PDX instead. Portland is home.

BAM! Some Portland facts even I didn't know

With a population of 556,000, Portland is Oregon’s largest city and the third largest in the Pacific Northwest, after Seattle, Washington, and Vancouver, British Columbia. Approximately 2 million people live in the surrounding metropolitan area, the 24th-largest in the U.S.

Portland was incorporated in 1851 and is the seat of Multnomah County. The city and region are notable for strong land-use planning and investment in public transit, supported by Metro, a distinctive regional-government scheme.

Portland lies in the Marine West Coast climate region, marked by warm summers and rainy but temperate winters, ideal for roses. Indeed, for more than a century Portland has been known as “The City of Roses”, and has many rose gardens, most famously the International Rose Test Garden in Washington Park.

Portland is also one of only two U.S. cities to contain an extinct volcano.

Traffic along the coast was named the worst tourist traffic in the United States.

Haters

Ok, I had to write something because our blog looked so lonely. Laurie and I just returned from a trip to Seattle where we had plenty of time to ponder the future of our new joint venture. Ideally this first post would be about something cool in Portland because that was the initial idea, to write about all the cool things to do in Portland and hopefully get us out to experience those cool things. That's still the intention, but here are some tangents Laurie and I discussed we might get off on:

1) Quotes from our favorite shows The Office and How I Met Your Mother
2) Laurie and I using the posts to talk to each other
3) Stuff about This American Life and Ira Glass (We heart Ira)

Well, I can't promise that any of the above mentioned items will NOT happen, but I know if you love us you will stick around and wait for the good stuff.

I do have something to write about Portland here. I just wanted to state that Laurie and I realized while in Seattle, how much we were hating on Seattle. I mean, I feel a special love because it's close to Portland and we're west coast representin', but so many things came to our attention that Portland is way cooler. Public Transportation, the weather, the neighborhoods, the overall feel. I think this is because Portland is now a special place in my heart, my new home. I never thought coming from a country girl background that I would ever grow to love a big city, but I really, really do love Portland. It took awhile to grow on me, in fact, I'm not gonna lie. I went through a hatin' period on Portland. But the longer I am here I realize why it's so awesome (hence why it's voted one of the most livable cities, and why we're dedicating a whole blog to its metropolitan goodness). Don't get me wrong Seattle, you have some cool stuff, like the Mariners, the Olympic Sculpture Garden, Ikea (not for long, Portland location opens this year), the bendy buses, the Space Needle, and the birth of grunge. I still have love, and I'm sorry I drank so much haterade, but just know that Portland is my baby, and you're like the third cousin who borrows money from me all the time and never pays me back. Still love you because you're west coast fam, but Portland is always going to be number one with me!