Happy Birthday Trip to Portland (Oregon)

We are environmentalists (means many things to many things, but try to be earth friendly with all our choices). My best friend and I dreamed of "heading west" when we were young and our trip to "every mall in CA" (as teenagers, we thought this was "the best") was refined to head to this environmentally friendly place that surprisingly, neither of us had been to. I like to give experiences as gifts, instead of useless "stuff" that collects dust, so I was happy to mark a special birthday to a place we could literally explore together. We're active and like to be entertained as well as educated, so we're trying to do it all, all with an eye on our impact to the environment!

Quick Tips:

We grabbed our car from the airport. I checked it out and a city rental would have cost more. EZ Rental was the cheapest, but we ultimately went with Thrifty due to a number of reasons. They are so nice and I'll pay more for customer service every time. We grabbed a quick lunch and headed to Mt. Hood, a very quick drive from Portland. We stayed in Portland to get a feel for the city Wednesday night. The AAA discounts are unbeatable and we found the nicest discount hotel ever. Thursday we headed to the coast because we wanted to see the sun set and it was a clear day. We found a great place on the Bay in Astoria, OR (you MAY remember this town from the movie "Goonies") to do that. We headed into Washington for cheaper hotel rates (but don't speed on the way to Long Beach, WA). I did get out of a ticket, but it was the first time ever, because of a very nice officer friendly!). There are cheap motels on the way to Long Beach, and officer friendly said he never got a call in 18 years and they were even cleaning them up better! Then on Friday, we headed to Mt. St. Helens. We found ourselves there on the 27th anniversary of the '80s eruption, a little randomly, but happy to find Ranger Todd at the top, who was nice and informative. We headed back towards Portland on Saturday.

A stop off at the Oregon Trail Interpretive center in Oregon City taught us that it is a can't miss! The rest of the weekend, we are spending in the city. Hit up the visitors center to learn what you should do! We hope to understand this wonderful city that bore all the great environmental ideas we're following in the midwest (finally). Be open to finding some great places, this part of our trip is serendipitous because we had no solid plans on where to stay - we just wanted to see a lot and didn't want to wear ourselves out with traveling too much.

Best Way To Get Around:

We got an economy car to get around to all the cities and things we wanted to see outside of the city. An economy car is plenty for just getting around, but get one with cruise if you plan on going outside the city! In Portland, there is a great, clean, nice, and friendly public transportation center - rivaling anything in European cities I've seen. It's not as huge as other major cities, but unlike something like Seattle, it's actually very useful and locals actually use it.

In Portland city-proper, there is a great train/bus system and the city is very safe, walkable, and friendly. Some of the transportation options are free (how cool is that?!). We're going to do a couple of bus tours and a boat tour and walk/public transport the rest. We looked into renting bikes...Portland should be the first US city that will rent some cheaper variety of bikes for free...that would be cool but for right now it's a little on the expensive side to have a bike to meander through the city with for the entire day...stay tuned, it's not out of reach for this green-friendly town!!!

Well, the hotel is okay. The room is large (larger than we needed because it was one of the last left). There are stains on the carpet tempered with kitchenette. However, my biggest problem with this property is the lack of customer service training. The desk clerk cleverly handled a group of people checking in but was rather rude when things slowed down. The manager seemed to back her up on thoughts and attitude. I really wanted to dip an aching leg into the hot tub and would have worked within all their constraints since the tub was technically closed the minute we checked in (huge bummer and real reason I agreed to pay more for more room than I needed/wanted).

I also realize that a busy hotel shouldn't bend rules for one person because they have rules for a reason, but sometimes those rules can be worked around when it's necessary or helpful. It seems like folks in the hospitality industry these days don't have much of a "hospitable" atmosphere, especially when they're making enough money not to be nice to every person as if it were their only guest! We'll see if the beds are comfortable!

Brian, at Thrifty Car Rental (who was the nicest employee at a busy car rental place I've ever known!), said this is the place he heads when he needs some grub. We were so hungry, we convinced the guy who cleans the cars out that we needed the car pronto and would go without getting it cleaned out for us. We made a beeline to this place and were floored at the number of choices.

At a busy lunch time, this place moved quickly but were nice and friendly, and answered all our questions. nice outdoor patio or indoor selections. Great, great food, and not just because we were starving! Most trips to the Pacific Northwest are long flights, and this is the only place you should eat when you get off the plane!