I set off for Voodoo Donuts. When people visit Seattle, they head to the Pike Place Market. When people visit Portland, they head to Voodoo Donuts. I'd read that sometimes the wait for a donut can last an hour.
The sign out front.
Stained glass windows featuring some of their donuts.
The box is a work of art. It says, "Good things come in pink boxes"
I got there a little after 9:00 am and walked right in. I'd read their menu offerings online before going so I quickly selected my dozen donuts. The music was blaring, the employees were tattooed and pierced, it was in interesting place. We didn't have any donuts until we got home that night. I had a part of the Memphis Mafia, a banana fritter drizzled with peanut butter, chocolate, peanuts and chocolate chips.
Anastaya liked the voodoo donut, filled with raspberry jelly. Isaac liked the bacon maple bar.
After buying the donuts, I had to walk the half mile back to the car carrying my heavy box of donuts. I wondered how many calories I was toting and felt like I was giving my biceps a small workout. With the donuts safely back in the car, I turned around and headed back the way I'd just come. Why the backtracking? I didn't want to carry donuts around all day. I headed over to the Lan Su Chinese Garden.
I spent an hour in the garden and would have lingered longer if other adventures weren't calling to me. If I lived in Portland, I would definitely have a yearly membership to this peaceful oasis in the middle of the city. The garden takes up an entire block and is walled on all sides. The only way to see it is to pay your $9.50 and head inside. It was another place that I visited where I thought Elizabeth would be a perfect companion.
vistas beyond vistas
example of a "leak" window
The Chinese are masters at drawing the eye. Each area of the garden is divided into "rooms" with peek-a-boo views through "leak" windows (windows which allow the view to leak through) into the next room. You just keep wanting to explore and see what is next.
All the pathways were works of art
A glimpse of the city beyond the garden.
I regretfully left the Chinese garden behind and headed for Cacao for a chocolate treat. I chose their drinking chocolate flight which has three cups of drinking chocolate: dark chocolate, cinnamon dark chocolate and spicy dark chocolate. The spicy dark chocolate was my favorite.
Three tiny cups of goodness.
I put my debit card and a quarter there so you could get an idea of their size.
We learned a new word in Portland, a "flight". I had to look it up. A flight is an assortment of small tastes of the same kind of food item, just different varieties.
After I finished my tasty treat, I walked over to Powell's book store to browse their extensive shelves. Where usually a store will have a small shelf on a topic, Powell's has an entire section. They have the used and new books mingled together which I like. The bookstore takes up an entire block.
I spent most of my time at my favorite area, memoirs. I'd looked for biographies on the map with at least fifty different categories listed and couldn't find them anywhere. I asked an employee at one of the many help desks where the biographies are. I was told they are distributed throughout the store by subject. I told him I was looking for the ordinary people writing about their lives. He told me to try the self help section.
a whole section for memoirs!
Powell's was another stop where I would have happily spent more time but the day was passing us by. Dode finished his conference and met me at Powell's. He stayed to browse for a while and then we headed over to a food cart "pod" for lunch. A pod is a grouping of food carts. The food carts we visited ringed a city block. We walked all the way around, checking everything out, before deciding what we'd have. It's at times like this that I wish Dode and I had compatible taste buds so we could each order something and share. He got fish and chips. I got Indian food.
so many choices.....
my lunch
Dode's lunch
Once we stuffed ourselves, we headed to the light rail station and did the tourist thing of riding it to the end of the line. When I was at Washington Park on Monday, I saw that the light rail went under the park. I saw that train station for the park was directly under the park and learned that the station is the deepest transit station in the US and the 3rd deepest in the world. I wanted a chance to use that station! The tunnel the transit passes through under the park is almost three miles long. The station was worth visiting. They have a core sample along the wall. They tell you how old each layer of earth is and what was happening at that time in the earth's history. They have a unique way of helping you know which train heads east and which heads west. The trains going east are in the yellow tunnel because the sun rises in the east. The trains going west were in the red tunnel, into the setting sun.
elevation at Washington Park Train Station
elevation at the surface
Proof that we made it to the end of the line!
After the train, our visit was coming to an end. We drove away from the downtown area for the last time. We made a detour to the other side of the river so I could visit Portland's vegan mini mall. It was underwhelming. I don't think Dode and I are the target demographic!
Four stores lined up along the street: grocery store, tattoo parlor, clothing store, bakery. I stopped at the grocery store to see if they carried any vegan tasties I've been missing out on. I picked up vegan feta and white chocolate peanut butter (health food, right?). We got some cookies at the bakery and headed for home, right in the heart of Portland rush hour traffic. As we were waiting our turn to approach the I-5 onramp, I saw this....
I saw a lot of signs like this around Portland. (I could have used one at home! I once crashed my bike going over the train tracks that cross the Centennial Trail. I banged up my knee pretty well.) Maybe I should buy one to install and put an "in honor of" plaque underneath it!) It truly is a bike friendly city. The downtown streets had more bicycles and transit vehicles than personal vehicles. Many streets had designated bike lanes. There were bike racks everywhere. We saw people biking morning, noon, and night.
We got home around 8:15 pm, just as my mom and Greg (who were helping the children for the evening and getting the house back in order for us) were leaving. We forced a donut on Greg and came home to lots of hugs and tattling on each other. The best part of a trip!
Elizabeth made us a welcome home card as big as her heart. Her message to us, "We missed you so much that we barely could sleep and eat. We're happy you're home. PS. The bigger the card, the greater the love."
I thoroughly enjoyed my time in Portland. It went by too fast! I loved exploring new area, visiting parks and museums, and being subject to only myself from 8:00 am-5:00 pm. Portland is a very vegan friendly place and I loved trying different things. I also indulged in too much non vegan food. By Wednesday night, I had a very sad tummy which lasted all night and into the next morning. Some of the vegan food I had was wonderful but everything seemed to be based around grains and protein with a sprinkling of veggies thrown on. I usually eat about 70-80% vegetables with just a little grains and protein (and then I follow it up with something sweet!). I started craving veggies in a big way. I woke up Friday morning in my own bed and my first thought was, "Veggies!" Good thing the produce co-op is soon so I can replenish my stock.
my lunch, a huge pile of vegetables with homemade balsamic and basil dressing and my new "feta" cheese (looks like feta, tastes like nothing!)
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