Postcards From Amy: Oregon 2012

Over President's Day weekend my friend Sarah and I went to Oregon to visit another friend of ours, Heather, and her husband, Chris. The great thing about visiting someone who has lived in a place you have never visited is that they have some insight on what to see and do or not to see and do. Before the trip I had googled things that we should to in Portland and with Heather's help we created an awesome itinerary. (More like Heather made the best itinerary with her knowledge and my research added just a bit) Also, the library where Heather lived had discount tickets for many of the entrance fees for tourist visits during the trip, great resource to have!

At the Airport: We're really excited to go see Heather

Random side story: Sarah and I flew on SouthWest and when boarding the plane Sarah spotted a cute little old man that she felt would be a safe bet of a stranger to sit by. We sat down and got ourselves settled and then I, trying to be friendly, asked the man a few light conversation questions like, "How are you?" "Is your travel for business or pleasure?" "Are you heading out or heading home?", with the intention that once the flight took off we would settle into our books, music or a nice nap... nope! The man talked to us THE ENTIRE FLIGHT! I did get one thing out of the conversation: The man told us that in life you only want to wear high heels for a short amount of time but running/athletic shoes with an arch support can be worn for ages. He then related marriage to shoes and that even though "high heels" are hot and lots of fun, it is better to have a shoe with an arch support for life.

As soon as we arrived in Portland Heather whisked us off to Multnomah Falls which was near the airport but out of our way for the rest of the trip... made sense to do it first. This was one of my most favorite stops of the trip. It was beautiful and we instantly got to see the green lush environment of Oregon. We hiked to the top of the waterfall which wasn't bad at all except that halfway up it started pouring cats and dogs; that didn't stop us though.

Our next stop was the Pittock Mansion, listed as one of the Top 10 Things to See in Portland. The mansion was home to a wealthy Portland family back in the 1910s and is now open to the public for tours today. The wife of the Pittock Family founded Portland's Rose Festival held every late May/ early June.

The next day we traveled to the coast but not without first stopping at the Tillamock Cheese Factory. FREE CHEESE SAMPLES! You'd be crazy not to stop!

Cape Meares

Cannon Beach

Another one of my favorite stops in the trip

Haystack Rock

We had lunch at Mo's which is right on Cannon Beach by Haystack Rock. The food was perfect for warming us up and the diner looked out over the ocean without a single thing blocking our view.

On our last day of our visit we went to Portland's Japanese Gardens, Powell's City of Books, and Voodoo Doughnuts.

The Japanese Gardens were beautiful; it was nice and calm for a last day thing.
If you love books you could spend HOURS at Powell's, the store takes up an entire block. It was so much fun to find books that were old and looked so classy and sophisticated. If you only have a limited amount of time, I would make a plan, before you go in, of all the sections you want to be sure to hit.
Voodoo Doughnuts is a must stop. Just a fun, crazy autmosphere. Sarah was brave and got some really fun doughnuts; one of which was a maple bar with a slice of bacon on top... she said it tasted like breakfast.

This trip was a mix of seeing a new place and spending time with old friends. It was so much fun talking and laughing, exploring and eating LOTS of food ( if you can call it that: fruit snacks, peanut butter m&ms, gummy worms, crackers, ice cream. I even got in trouble with Heather's husband for eating a cookie before I ate my breakfast one morning.)

One Cherry on the Top of the trip: While living in Oregon Heather and Chris had gotten hooked on the TV show Finding Bigfoot (a show about people claiming they have spotted Bigfoot and experts going to the locations of these sightings and trying to track him down). They found the show absolutely hilarious but also couldn't get enough of it. They introduced Sarah and I to the show and we loved what a riot it was!