My PureView of Portland

I’d heard the legends of Portland. I’d heard about this “dream of the 90’s” vibe.  Actually, I’d only really seen the TV show “Portlandia” on Netflix.

When the opportunity came up to visit Portland, I jumped at it.  What did I find out? What did I see?  I can tell you that I spent time with a relatively new friend and friend that I’ve known since high school.  I traveled from Portland proper to places named Bored, Happy Valley, Damascus and Tigard.  Beyond that?  Well, you’re going to have to follow along after the break, to find out.

My Portland story starts on the island of Catalina at the Catalina Film Festival.  One of the sponsors was eCom Merchant Solutions and the CEO was a crazy-fun woman named Kristie Kliese.  We hit it off and stayed in touch on Facebook where she also saw that I did photography work. About a month ago, I got a call from Kristie and she offered to fly me out for her 50th birthday celebration if I’d take photos of the event.  So let’s start there…

First impressions can be a great thing.  I landed at PDX airport and my checked bag came out in record time.  The really cool part was that I turned around and saw a familiar face. It was Faith, who works at eCom and I had met her in Catalina too.  How could anything go wrong when this face greets you?

She didn’t have champagne in her hand since she was driving, but she had a big smile and her usual friendly demeanor.  I was also shocked that she parked and came inside to greet me.  In LA people circle the airport until you call them with a column number of where to meet you.  This was a great start to my trip.

Well played Portland.

We arrived at Kristie’s house and she was resting, but her boyfriend Scott was there as was her assistant Mary.  They are pictured below and I’ll let you decipher who was who.

Anyway, they were great and were getting the party together.  It came out that Kristie wasn’t just resting but that she has some stomach issue…on her birthday. Ugh.  We all had to keep on keeping on in her name.  With that being said, I had pictures to take.  I’m not going to post them all , but here comes a few highlights.  Please note that most of these were shot with my Canon 40D DSLR and not my Nokia Lumia 1020.  Remember the paying client dilemma?

KK50 Party Sample Pictures VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

OK, so these are some of the pretty people of Portland, but someone is missing.  Never fear, I captured the birthday girl with most of her staff on one of her visits downstairs.

The party was amazing.  The people were amazing.  The food was amazing.  The drinks?  Yes.  Amazing.  Somehow we all got up for breakfast.  It was also in the amazing range of goodness.  Here’s my plate.

Yes, I took a bit of time to arrange the plate.  Yes, I got called a photo nerd! Thanks, Scott.  I can’t be mad at him though. He did take me on a “test drive” of Kristie’s new Tesla.  Sidenote: The Tesla is SWEET!  If you have the means, I highly recommend it; it is so choice. (Bonus points for naming the movie reference in the comments)

I had such a great time with Kristie and her crew.  I should mention that her kids were awesome and made me want to maybe….uh…never mind.  Let’s move on.

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On Saturday, I transferred my Portland experience duties to Christina and Chad.  I’ve known Christina since high school and we were such good friends that I was a bridesman in their wedding. True story.  They are both great and have a great son.  It had been 9.5 years since I’d seen Christina and Chad, so it was all nostalgic and emotional.

Chad made some Mexican food for dinner. ARG…I didn’t get any pictures of that.  Then we chatted and decided that Christina and I would head out to downtown Portland.  We went to see the tranny show at Darcelle’s.  It wasn’t Vegas, so I can show pics of what happened, right?

Yes, that happened and then we had to get VooDoo Doughnuts.

The joint is hip and happening at all hours!

Here is Christina and I posing with our box.

Oh yeah, I got the maple/bacon!

OK, so that was a late night, but we got up and planned to tackle some nature sights!  First, we had sushi on a conveyor belt for lunch.

Now that we were nourished we headed up to see some nature. I was worried that some of it would get on me, but I braved it.  I braved it for you, my blog readers.

Here’s a panorama from the Vista House on Crown Point in the Columbia River Gorge.

After this we wanted to get close to the action, so we hit the road…

…saw some creepy abandoned house…

…and saw some waterfalls!  Christina and I acted scared. Don’t ask me why?  It just seemed photogenic, at the time.  We do it for you, people!

Oh, I took a Vine video!

After the falls, we went back downtown to the Bridgeport Brew Pub.  We had beer and food.  Interesting fact: Bridgeport is the first brew pub that I’ve ever been to that had a vegan section on the menu. Hmmm….back the beer!

These are the taps and the containers and the menu above…the trifecta!

Here is Christina and Chad.  I don’t think they know that I’m taking their picture.  Actually, I think Christina had just taken a picture and might even be posting it to Facebook.   As you can see we all had a flight.

After that it was home sweet (their) home, but we had a busy day ahead of us in the morning.

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I’m likely to get the order of things wrong, but I’ll get the details right.

I wanted to take a picture of the “Smallest City Park In The World”…and I did…and you get to see it.  You’re welcome!

Small, right?  I hear that it is more impressive in the summer.  Come on Portland, put a little evergreen in there for the winter months.

There’s a lot of brick downtown and they have trains that run in the street.

I went TAX FREE shopping and scored a wallet at Nordstrom Rack.  We walked the riverfront. I saw a permanent porta poddy, which I think is for the homeless crowd.  We visited the angry feminist bookstore from Portlandia.  That was a lot. Let’s catch up with pics!

Porta Loo

New wallet – TAX FREE PURCHASE! Whoop

Angry Feminist Bookstore. It was close. I theorized that it was closed on Monday because that’s too close to MANday.  They were also close on Sunday…SONday, right?  I see what they did there.

Oh, Christina and Ben “at the park”.  We had to take him to a bigger park.

Oh my…the pancakes.  Christina’s friend suggested this place.  First some pics and then another Vine video

Finally, we hit up the Chinese Gardens in Downtown Portland.  I took a ton of pictures, but I’ll only post a few  here.  You’re great to have stuck it out this long.  I don’’

Chinese Gardens VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

After this we hit the traffic and headed to PDX airport.  We hung out in the airport for a bit and chatted before I went through security.  I realized that I miss my friend and I love quick trips.  I need to find ways to get back out there to Portland.

It is a land where the the Vegan Hipsters coexist with the Camo’d Hunters.  It is a place where everyone will speak to you.  It is a place where I have friends, new and old.  It is a place where the “dream of the 90’s is alive”.