PORTLAND EXPERIENCES TO WRITE HOME ABOUT

Portland experiences come with Airbnb.

The Portland Monthly has a list of the Top 5 Airbnb Experiences.

Oddly enough, riding around town with me isn’t listed, but milking a cow in Sandy is?

Let’s cruise in my ride and I’ll point things out you need to know.

Portland experiences with BoomerPdx begins on the Oregon side of Portland.

The way it’s set up, the Willamette River separates Portland from the Oregon side of Portland.

The Oregon side is the east side. Why?

Because it looks like the rest of Oregon. If you plan a short visit and don’t get out to the rest of the state, just drive around Portland’s east side.

The west side is big and beautiful and available to visitors to gawk and squint in the light reflected off of steel and glass towers.

Not a problem on the east side, and the further out you get, the less light you see.

Except for special occasions.

A reader had this to say about 82nd Ave:

As someone who’s lived on king rd and se 82nd the traffic is heavy, there’s drug addiction, crime, and broken glass. 82nd is the avenue of broken hearts and drugs. There are few perks like grocery stores up the street from each other and if you got late night munchies there are mini marts everywhere.

In other words, 82nd is a microcosm of urban life.

Whether it’s the life you want a part of, or not, it’s there for the taking.

Or maybe you want something more from 82nd?

You’ll find that, too.

Portland Experiences, Beginning With The Vanport Flood

Drive north on MLK until you pass the industrial area and see the Interstate Bridge and I-5.

This is where the Memorial Day flood of 1948 ripped through Oregon’s second biggest city and toppled buildings.

That’s an experience to avoid, but it happened.

Take a good look around. It may not be your hometown, but it’s the same devastation every community faces from catastrophic events.

One of the buildings in the flood was the Vanport Extension Center, a name that eventually changed to Portland State University.

Portland State University (PSU) is a public research university in Portland, Oregon. It was founded in 1946 as a post-secondary educational institution for World War II veterans. It evolved into a four-year college over the following two decades and was granted university status in 1969. It is the only public university in the state of Oregon that is located in a large city.

Since Portland is the only Oregon city outsiders would consider ‘large’ it makes sense.

The college made its way from Delta Park to the Southwest Park Blocks, two beautiful one way streets between Broadway and 10th full of museums, churches, and apartment buildings.

We’re headed that way.

Over Portland’s Best Bridge

Crossing from east side to west takes us past University of Portland, through St. Johns, to this big beauty, the St. Johns Bridge.

Highway 30 runs along the Willamette past the next catastrophic event in waiting: fuel and oil storage facilities that will blow when the big earthquake hits.

Experts say it is inevitable.

But, not today.

Portland is its own tale of two cities with the best of times and the worst of times, at the same time.

NW 23rd Avenue

This is the former location of QP, or Quality Pie.

Yes, it’s a bare lot with “retail opportunities.”

It’s also been a big mystery for thirty years of Portland experiences.

In May, a long-empty commercial building at the corner of Northwest 23rd Avenue and Northrup Street disappeared with the swing of a wrecking ball.

Until 1992, the low-slung masonry structure contained a beloved late-night hangout, Quality Pie. But as the Alphabet District morphed from a string of low-rent housing and one-tap taverns into a cluster of boutiques and top-flight restaurants, the building remained dark.

The QP was a place to take visitors late at night for a taste of Portland.

Portland loses another dining institution when Quality Pie, a 24-hour haven for hipsters, scenesters, scamsters, hamsters, rock stars (pre- and post-nova), street people, alcoholics in various stages of recovery, poets, gamers, insomniacs and other assorted creatures of the night, serves its final cup of joe.

What’s cooking now:

Crossing Burnside To Vista

The view changes once you’re headed up Vista, a wide road flanked by big, beautiful, houses.

If you move to Portland and land in one of these mansions, you’ve arrived in style.

This is a neighborhood acceptable to executives climbing the corporate ladder, as well as long time residents trying to pay property taxes on increasing home values.

One will move on with the next promotion, one will move on only when death calls.

Neither will choose Suicide Bridge.

Keep going up until you find Myrtle Street and turn left. Keep going on Myrtle until you turn left on Broadway and head down the hill from another vantage point.

Now you see Portland like the days when Portland Airport was located on Swan Island.

It feels like a low altitude flight down to the hairpin turn for an 180 degree view of the city.

Portland Experiences Stoned Near 405

Swooping down from the west hills on Broadway empties out near 405 and Portland State.

People used to camp there, but not so much after the rocks were unloaded.

Instead of a ‘camp sweep’ to dislodge homeless campers with human resources, a new policy invokes choice.

You can set up camp on the rocks, or not.

Everywhere I saw rocks I didn’t see campers, so something is changing.

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When you visit Portland look for a picture beyond the usual tourist pamphlets and traps.

Look for Washington Park, the road under the east side ramps to the Morrison or Hawthorne bridges, and forest bathing.

“This is where the car chase in French Connection was filmed.”

It wasn’t, but it feels like it might be.

Look at the houses in different parts of town. This is how people live here, from the classic craftsman to the dorm-sized modern apartments for non-hoarding residents.

This is the Portland picture, now put yourself in it.

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