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Portland is a wonderful place to visit, perfect for many different kinds of travelers. From vacationing families to single backpackers, from those on a business trip to the most leisurely of journies, Portland Oregon supplies a wide range of sights, attractions and events to please and entertain. If you are planning a visit to this part of Oregon, book your Portland Oregon accommodations online and rest easy - your low price is guaranteed to save you money! So whether you are in the area for the first time or a local looking for an escape, Oregon-Accommodations has a great Portland hotel room waiting for you.
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Portland: City of
Books, Beer, Bikes and Blooms
by Leon SchwarzbaumThe Chamber of Commerce
may call it "City of Roses," but with 12 colleges and universities
and a young professional population, Portland, OR is also known for
its contemporary rock'n'roll, hip coffee houses, unconventional art
and world-class book stores. An inland port on the Columbia and
Willamette River network, Portland is hip. Portland may also seem
laid back to the outsider, but cool doesn't necessarily mean
unexciting. Cops with beards and executives' bikes parked outside of
a high-rise office building are small clues to what's going on.
One local source describes Portland as "the city of books,
beer, bikes and blooms." Let's look and see if it meets the
specifications:
You can find Barnes & Noble, B. Dalton
and Borders Books in several places. But you can also find literally
scores of small booksellers. But Powell's Books, occupying an entire
city block and stocking more than one million volumes, takes the
cake for the world's largest book store. While the impressive number
of other book vendors continue to draw their steadies, Powell's is
definitely the place to go to sip coffee and eyeball the
bibliophiles of Portland. Staff members distribute maps of the
store's floors and, while not verifiable, rumor has it a rescue
squad is available to find and re-orient browsers lost in the
stacks.
The city's love affair with beer began, according to
legend, in 1888, when Henry Weinhard and a few of the less-inhibited
city leaders proposed pumping ale to the Skidmore Fountain, through
the city's fire hoses. Only the possibility that the thirsty
residents would puncture the hoses deterred them from this feat of
civic glory. Today, more than 40 craft breweries and brewpubs slake
the thirst of locals and visitors, who sometimes talk about their
"Munich on the Willamette."
Just ask any Portland native
about her/his favorite beer and you'll get as many answers as people
you query. Then go ahead on your own. Try an English-style stout.
Maybe a foamy unfiltered Hefeweizen. Or (shudder) a brew made with
raspberries. You will recall the standard dialogue from any early
Western movie: Bartender: "What'll ya have, stranger?" Gunslinger
(looking around the room and eyeing the unlabeled bottle in the
barkeep's hand), "You pour it, I'll drink it." That's my reaction to
the brews in Portland.
Most of the "micro" breweries produce
"craft" beers - heavy with distinct flavor and color. "Guest" beers
are brewed by other brewers and are sold to those whose palates are
not so sophisticated as to enjoy a beer that is redolent of an old
keg.
Let's start at the Lucky Labrador Brewing Co., at 915
S.E. Hawthorne Blvd, where, in addition to five house beers, a guest
beer is usually featured. Beer at the Lucky Labrador is served in
18-ounce glasses. I suggested we start here because the food is
somewhat better than most of the other beer joints, and very
reasonably priced. Try the sausage cooked in stout (ale) on a
sandwich, or any one of the other offerings.
Mount Tabor
Theater and Pub at 4811 S.E. Hawthorne Blvd. is a movie theater and
pub with live music. Food is limited to so-so pizza and nachos, but
of the 19 taps, 16 dispense micros. A fuzzy evening can be spent
here, just sampling.
Not to be outdone, Mickey Finn's Brew
Pub has 26 taps. But no beer is brewed on the premises. Food, in the
form of a pub menu (burgers, snacks, sandwiches), is available, and
for those athletically inclined, pool tables are available in the
back.
If it's English atmosphere you want, try Horse Brass
Pub (a horse brass is a harness ornament) at 4534 S. Belmont, where
39 microbrewed and imported beers are available. In keeping with the
English decor, food such as bangers and chips (sausages and French
fries), Scotch eggs and other cholesterol enhancers is served. Next
door at Belmont Station, the pub's retail store, you can buy such
essential items as tee shirts and breweriana (souvenirs and other
beer-related junk).
You'll also find McMenamins Pub-Brewery
branches around town. This is a family-owned chain of pubs that
seems to be doing well but which lacks the quirkiness of some of the
other pubs in town.
Portland was voted by those who vote on
such things as one of the three most bicycle-friendly cities in the
U.S. Stop in at Gateway Bicycles at 11905 N.E. Halsey for bikes,
biking gear and the latest news of the biking community. And if the
weather keeps you indoors, stop in at Spinning at 11903, next door,
and use the indoor biking fitness center to keep the calves tight.
Portland is also easy to get around in via public
transportation. Light rail trains provide frequent and convenient
in-town and suburban service.
Building height restrictions
limit high pedestrian density and provide sunlight at street level,
parks and fountains can be seen almost everywhere and Mount Hood's
beauty can be seen from every part of the city. Portland boasts
37,000 acres of park space (including some highly-valued downtown
properties), creating a feeling of openness not usually seen in a
major city.
For those who remember how to walk (the
old-fashioned way of getting around), city blocks are laid out on a
manageable 200-foot module, making it possible to judge the time and
effort it will take to reach a destination. To see some of the roses
Portland is famous for, visitors to Washington Park can take a free
shuttle, from Memorial Day to Labor Day, to the Rose and Japanese
gardens. While at the park, take the bus to the arboretum and the
zoo and see how locals spend their days off.
What's that,
you say? Culture? Like the Portland Art Museum, the Oregon Symphony
or the Portland Opera? Festivals, you say? Like the Rose Festival,
the Mt. Hood Jazz Festival, the Chamber Music of the Northwest
Festival? Or maybe you mean the reason Portland is the blues capital
of the Northwest, the Waterfront Blues Festival every weekend all
summer long at McCall Waterfront Park.
You're about 60 miles
from Mt. Hood, where an average of 200 inches of snow permits
yearround skiing most years. You're about 90 miles from the sandy
beaches on the Pacific coast. And you're within driving distance of
some of the West Coast's finest wineries.
If all of these
things aren't hip, what is?
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