On October 2nd, our flight from Houston to Denver for our layover. Funny story. Houston has two airports. We went to the wrong one. Whoops. What you get for not looking at detail. Luckily we made it to the other one in time.
Arrived in Denver airport. Loving the view. Hopefully I can visit here soon. Split a Pesto Chicken Multigrain Ciabatta with Mum and got myself a water.
Landing in Portland. Look at all those trees. Gorgeous. I always seem to sit at the wing of the plane unintentionally.
Found Sissy and BIL’s car and we headed for lunch.
Deschutes Brewery
210 NW 11th Ave
Portland, Oregon 97209
(503) 296-4906
www.deschutesbrewery.com
Sample Tray [6 (4oz) glasses of either the Classic Six, Brewer’s Choice, or Choose Your Own] | $8
We chose our own six as listed above. My favorite is the Gluten Free Beer.
Beer Cheese Soup [seasonal potato cheese soup featuring local potatoes, speciality cheeses and one of our specialty ales] | $5.5 cup $7.5 bowl
Sissy got this with her meal so I snagged some. So freaking good especially on this day since it was rainy. Super cheesy that a lot of the cheese residue stuck on the spoon!
Brewery Burger [seared Coleman Ranch beef, Mirror Pond Pale Ale aioli, Tillamook cheddar, butter leaf lettuce, hot house tomatoes, shaved red onion, and brewery made pickles with your choice of pub fries, sweet potato fries, house salad, or cup of soup] | $12
Got the pub fries since Mum got the sweet potato fries and Sissy got the soup. Both the fries were good. They were crispy and thick but soft on the inside just like great fries should be! I’d chose the sweet potato ones next time though. They had a sweet and salty combination. Perfect.
The burger on the other hand was a bit bitter for my taste and kind of wished the bun was softer so that I didn’t have to try so hard to bite through it. Let’s just say stuff were falling left and right. I resulted in cutting it with my knife and fork sans top bun.
After lunch we went on a walk to the ever so famous:
Powell’s Bookstore
40 NW 10th Ave
Portland, Oregon 97209
(503) 228-4651
www.powells.com
Books among books. Underground and over to the other side. I could stay here forever. They have Powell’s all over the state! Even in the airports! People in Oregon seem to really love to read. It was a Wednesday afternoon and there were a lot of people in the bookstore. They’re definitely not going to be going bankrupt anytime soon.
They even sold Cupcake Toothpaste. I would of bought it but I didn’t want it to be another Bacon Necklace incident.
Went walking to our next destination. Elephant statue. So cute. And Chinatown. (duh.)
Voodoo Doughnut
22 SW 3rd Ave
Portland, Oregon 97205
(503) 241-4704
www.voodoodoughnut.com
We all picked random donuts we wanted to eat. We ended up with … too much.
The two pictured are:
Voodoo Doll Doughnut [raised yeast doughnut filled with raspberry jelly topped with chocolate frosting and a pretzel stake]
All their Voodoo Dolls had different characteristics. Was not a big fan of the raspberry jelly.
Cock-N-Balls Doughnut [cock-n-balls shaped raised yeast doughnut triple filled with Bavarian cream and topped with chocolate frosting]
It was their Cocktoberfest. ha So silly.
I wish I had more time to look at the menu. I suggest if you go here, go online and look up what you want first. You cannot see what you’re order. Just the names are written on the board. Online, it describes what they are.
I don’t think they’re as great as people say they are but if I ever do go back I’ll order all the Apple Fritter Doughnuts and Blueberry Cake Doughnuts. They were the best. And be aware of the donuts with cereal on top. Sissy and BIL got those previously and told us that they were stale. Gross.
We walked back to our car and drove to the top of Rocky Butte which had a park (Joseph Wood Hill Park) where you can see the gorgeous landscape of Oregon.
They have a rock? statue? with different places like Mt. Hood, Columbia River, and Mt. Tabor. Apparently this has been replaced (I guess updated?) November of 2002.
No words. Pictures don’t do it any justice.
We drove to their apartment where we got to see Bruno!! and we relaxed for a good while. Then headed to dinner. It was rainy and dark so I couldn’t get a picture of the market until the next day.
New Seasons Market
15861 SE Happy Valley Town Center
Happy Valley, 97086
(503) 558-9214
www.newseasonsmarket.com
This place is like Whole Foods in which you can get food from the Hot and Cold bar. Split a Minestrone with Sissy and got myself a big ol’ amazing salad. YUM!
We headed back to the apartment and just went lazy and into bed.
Great first night. Day 2 coming up …
I actually didn’t think the VooDoo Doughnuts were “that great” either. I think it was more the WOW factor of them. I was excited that they had a vegan option, although I wasn’t a vegan when I went there. I had planned to get a dozen, but then realized they were all different prices so I ended up buying like 5. Powell’s is pure book heaven.
glad we’re in the same boat! haha I realized there are more vegan/vegetarian options up in the north. not so much so down here. :/
I’m not going to lie, I’m kind of happy to hear that VooDoo isn’t all it’s hyped up to be. I hear people raving about it constantly but I had a feeling it was mainly because of the crazy flavors, not quality/taste. At least you can say you’ve been!
It looks like such a fun trip! The restaurant where I work actually offers beer flights like that, paired with a different mini-burger for each beer. It’s really cool!
the flavors weren’t even that crazy in my opinion. I think it’s just named something different from what’s the norm. but yess! I can say I had a voodoo doll and some cock n balls … as great as that can sound. haha I need to visit your restaurant. that sounds DELICIOUS!
This looks like a really fun day! I have always wanted to see Portland – it seems so hip and progressive and creative and really interesting.
Especially Powell’s – it’s hard to imagine what all of those books would look like in one place!
You should def. go. so much fun. everything is GORGEOUS!! wish I had more time at Powell’s!