Our Jaunt Around Portland…
My daughter and I spent the first five days of June in and around the quirky, fun and oh so friendly city of Portland. I had been setting aside some mullah for her senior photos and senior activities and what not.
However, when the time came, she told me she didn’t want any of it, and so I figured why not use that mullah on a senior trip. After all, memories trump stuff – right? So, she told me what city was #1 on her bucket list and we packed our bags and headed to the Northwest.
And, what a memory-maker that trip turned out to be!
As we roamed around the city of Portland, we inhaled almost every flavor of the donuts offered up at Blue Star Donuts, a creepy looking Voodoo donut and mango Tang donut (hello childhood) at Voodoo Donuts and a quirky-sounding yet out-of-this-world-delicious Coava Coffee & Cocanú Craque shake at Salt and Straw.
No – donuts and shakes were not all we had – we also had loads and loads of coffee! 😆
And we balanced all the donuts and coffee and shakes with walks on the waterfront as well as rides on the Aerial Tram. And, when we got lost (which I am very good at doing) there always seemed to be a friendly face offering to help.
We also managed to make it out to Haystack rock on Cannon Beach, Hug Point Beach with a waterfall and caves right there on the beach, the heavily wooded trails of Short Sands trail that lead us to the incredibly secluded Short Sands Beach, and the little town of Manzanita with it’s long and foggy beach.
Driving in Portland was a dream as what the locals refer to traffic there is not the sort of traffic I’ve gotten accustomed to here in Atlanta – and I didn’t even have to pump my own gas!
Not only is the traffic a breeze, but I was thrilled to see how close the beaches were on one side and mountains with their magnificent waterfalls were on the other.
If you follow me on Instagram, you would have seen some of these pictures on my Insta stories already.
These are views I simply couldn’t tire of. We also visited a dear, old friend in the town of Hood River where he drove us to some of the most marvelous views of Mt. Hood and the surrounding area.
I’ve been hearing so much about Portland lately! I’m really glad that you gals took this trip. (I totally agree that memories last longer than photos…and it looks like you took plenty of awesome photos while you were out there!) The Pacific Northwest has been on my to-visit list for a while now, and I think it just moved up a spot higher. I’m glad you and Lil Shashi were able to get some hiking in there, too. I mean that helps balance out the doughnuts and shakes! 🙂 And the hiking/terrain out there looks so different than what I’m used to here on the east coast. Love this post, Shashi!!
What a wonderful trip this was! So much natural beauty! Ah I want to go now!
Loved your pictures and story of Portland Shashi!
Those waterfalls reminded me of our time in Hawaii. 🙂
Portland is fun! We can really close to move there in the 90’s — and sometimes I wonder whether we should have gone. Fun read — thanks.
Such a lovely place. Portland, Oregon is on my list. I haven’t ventured out much on the west coast besides NoCal and SoCal 🙂 I want to visit Portland, Seattle and Vancouver someday. You and your daughter seem to share a very strong and unbreakable bond. That’s beautiful.
It seems like you had an awesome time, Shashi! Are there any good hiking trails you’d like to recommend?