Things To Do
Wyrd Leatherworks and Meadery
Amazing Mead hall in our neighbood in SE Portland. Stay till last call around 10pm for a special experience.
EARTH Space PDX
This amazing community and wellness center is right in our neighborhood. If your staying in Portland for a few days consider checking out a class here. They have an art opening the first Friday of every month, which the Friday before the wedding happens to be so check it out if you're around and currious.
Gladstone Street Pub
This is our neighborhood pub and has Kat's favorite food in Portland: the Veggie Meatloaf. Sarah always gets a Bluebomber Burger with a Beyond Burger. Affordably priced.
Yoko's Japanese Restaurant & Sushi Bar
Really good sushi in our neighborhood.
Kati Portland
This is a great vegetarian restaurant on Division street which has a ton of great bars, restaurants, and stores.
Salt & Straw
You can find Salt & Straws throughout Portland and they're a must visit for any icecream lover. Flavors are unique and delicious.
Cloud City Ice Cream
Lighter but just as flavorful as Salt & Straw. Oh yeah, its next to a Safeway which is a great place to shop if you need affordable and quality groceries.
People's Food Co-op
People's Food Co-op is a community owned grocery store where you can find local produce, bulk goods, and a wide selection of mostly locally sourced groceries. There is a farmers market every Wednesday from 1 to 6pm.
Pinolo Gelato
This place is amazing. We can't recommend it enough.
Blue Star Donuts
Our favorite Portland donuts. A bit pricey but so worth it.
¿Por Qué No?
One of the first places we went to eat in Portland when we visited together for the first time. Very centrally located in a very nice part of Northeast Portland with many restaurants, parks, and things to do.
Bamboo Sushi
This might be one of the most delicious and strange sushi restaurants we've ever been too. The food is absolutely delicious and very affordable for the cost; the sake is similarly tasty and very inexpensive. Some of our favorite dishes include the Vegetable Tempura, the Green Machine roll (seriously you need to try this), and the Crispy Garlic Tofu (order a side of rice). Also, they are said to have a good vegetarian burger ... yes, a burger from a sushi spot.
Wildish Botanicals
Wildish is our favorite local herb store run by our friend Paul. Paul stocks a curated selection of bulk herbs alongside his own tincture blends that mix western herbs with Chinese medical theory; he also makes and sells mushroom powder blends and a wide selection of products from local creators.
Roots & Crowns Apothecary
A cute apothecary shop in the NW that has home items, self-care items, and witchy gifts!
Mount Tabor
Mount Tabor is a massive and amazing park located on the remains of an extinct volcano. Walk, run, or bike to the top, enjoy the views of the city from one of the two historic reservoirs, or wander in the woods. For the past couple of years there have been Wednesday night pop up raves near the reservoirs; one of the many fabulous oddities of Portland for the adventurous.
Powell Butte
Another extinct volcano but a bit bigger than Mount Tabor and located slightly out of town in Gresham. A great place to hike and to have a view of Mount Hood and Mount Saint Helens when the skies clear. There are several different ecosystems here and its possible to hike to the bottom from the parking lot on the top; or find a neighborhood entrance and hike from the bottom up.
Forest Park
There is a massive forest in the middle of the more metropolitan west side of Portland. The first time I drove into it I thought I had driven out of Portland and into the mountains. So many places to hike here. Its also home/adjacent to other wonderful places to visit like Hoyt Arboretum and the Rose Garden. This part of Portland takes many trips to fully experience.
International Rose Test Garden
Portland is Rose City after all so it only makes sense to make a visit to the Rose Garden. The roses are in bloom for most of the year in Portland's magical climate but they will be in full force around the time of the wedding. Great place for an impromptu photo shoot.
Hoyt Arboretum
Its going to be gorgeous here in early July. Its absolutely massive and so wonderfully curated. Its next to the zoo and a forestry museum as well as having a connection to the Wildwood Trail reach goes many miles from the Arboretum into Forest Park.
Oaks Bottom Wildlife Refuge
Located near hip Sellwood, honestly one of our favorite neighborhoods, is a wetland wildlife refuge. Portland is home to so many bird species include herons. Another great place is Reed Canyon in the middle of the Reed College campus not far from where we live. Both places have simple but enjoyable forest trails.
Tryon Creek State Natural Area
This park is absolutely beautiful year round from the vibrancy of summer foliage to the wonder of fern covered trees in winter. There are horse trails here. Taking a horse to the venue? The state park near the venue actually has special accommodations for people with. Just a thought.
Sauvie Island
Want to go someplace that feels remote but doesn't require traveling that far out of Portland? Sauvie Island is your place. Home to wineries, farm, wildlife preserves, hikes, and beaches; home to one of two nude beaches near Portland.
Clackamas River
Tubing down the Clackamas is one of our favorite summer afternoon activities. You'll need two cars and your own tubes for this adventure; and about 4-7 hours to spare. We rent our tubes from https://oregonriverrentals.com/ and are very happy with the durability of the tubes; he runs his business out of his garage but its not as sketchy as that sounds. You'll want to drop one car off at Barton Park and then drive over to Carver Park to start your adventure. We tend to go in groups and like to tie our tubes together. There are rock hazards and some light rapids but none that are too dangerous. We once watched a man in a very tiny tube sleep while floating down the river. The entire journey is about 4 hours and its nice to bring some beverages and snacks.
Rooster Rock State Park
Travel east on 84 out of Portland you quickly enter the Columbia River Gorge as you drive along the famous river. About half an hour out town you'll find Rooster Rock state park which is home to one of the most sandy and large beaches in Portland especially in late summer. That beach is a nude beach and most people are indeed in some manner of undress. Its fairly easy to find a nice secluded spot in the grasses on the near side or you can either swim, ford, or walk, depending on level of the water to a sandbar in the Columbia. Oh yeah! This is where you can swim in the Columbia and it isn't always freezing! Highly recommend for the adventurous and those who desire a beach and don't mind some nudity. Take a right out of the entrance gate and park as far east as possible. You'll see people walking down a slope towards the beach which is about a half a mile hike. There's also a public, non-nude beach right at the parking lot down some steep steps, but its honestly just nowhere as nice.
Astoria
If you love the Goonies you need to go here. We don't advise trying to find the house (it does exist though) but highly suggest checking out the water front, the historical buildings, the mysterious underground mini-mall with an apothecary and a portal into an unknown realm curated by an actual gnome, and the general odd vibes of this seaport town. It's a really weird place. Astoria is about 2 hours northwest of Portland. Maybe aim for Fort Stevens and check out the shipwreck along the coast or the old naval bunkers. For the adventurous we suggest driving over the massive bridge into Washington. For those with 3 or more days to spare we highly suggest the Olympic Peninsula in the west of Wasthington; there is so much wonder here and its mostly all along route 101. We particularly recommend Hoh Nation Forest, Hurricane Ridge, and Port Townsend; you can catch a ferry there to the San Juan Islands as well.
Tillamook Creamery
We don't know much about the town of Tillamook beyond that it's where our favorite farmer owned creamery with some of the best cheese in the country is located. You can sample the cheese and watch it made at the factory and then get some of their delicious ice-cream in the food court. Blue Heron Creamery is down the road and they have a few cheeses, oils, creams, and sauces to sample; they also have goats. The Tillamook area is about 2 hours from Portland heading west through Tillamook State Forest which is itself a place of endless exploration. There's some places to camp around here but spots fill up quickly and reservations tend to start 6 months in advance.
Cape Meares Lighthouse
Located west of Tillamook along the coast is a series of lighthouses among which the Cape Meares lighthouse is the most northern. This stretch of coast features gorgeous view of towering sea rocks, beach with secret tunnels through the cliff side, and of course lighthouses. At Cape Meares there's an astonishing tree known as the Octopus Tree.
Manzanita
Manzanita is a pleasant little stretch of coast with a pleasant little coastal town attached. Manzanita has its own microclimate that seems to avoid rain more often than the other parts of the coast. Still, I wouldn't recommend swimming anywhere on the coast; way too cold anytime of year. About two hours east of Portland.
Mount Hood
Mount Hood is humongous and can be seen clearly from Portland. You can get close to the base of this massive mountain about 2 hours southeast of Portland. There's a few ski resorts on the mountain that sometimes have summer activities. Trillium lake is a little bit over an hour from Portland and is a great place to swim which isn't a river and it has an amazing view of Mount Hood. There's Lost Lake which can be reached by first driving east on 84 and then south; much closer to the mountain and has both a hotel and a campground.
Detroit Lake
Detroit Lake is our favorite weekend getaway. We know a campground a little bit out of town on Bureau of Land Management land with spacious camp sites that are free to camp at. Its next to the amazing Breitenbush Hot Springs but there's also some public hotsprings just across the cold river where there was once another resort; these hot springs attract the most bizarre people and is possibly home to faeries. Its also clothing optional. Detroit lake itself is a crystal clear lake that is a refreshing dip in the hot summer afternoons.
Painted Hills
The Painted Hills are a wonder of nature located about 4 hours southeast of Portland in the John Day Fossil Beds. The Painted Hills themselves are a treasure trove of fossils and geological history. A great place for photos as well as the true wonder are the uniquely colored hills that truly look painted. Would recommend camping at any one of the many campgrounds in the great John Day area. Also, look up who John Day is, its very much worth it for a laugh.
Sisters
Sisters is a favorite frontier town east of the Cascades heading toward the high desert. You can find Sisters about 4 hours away from Portland by first going south on highway 5 and then east on route 20. For those of you who are familiar with Central New York, yes its that exact route 20; the endpoint is actually in weird Newport. Sisters has a lot of cute shops and places to eat and is a good jumping off point for exploring either the mountains or the high desert.
Bend
Bend is not too far away from Sisters and is a very cute modern city where all the techies from California are moving too. One of the big highlights here is the Deschutes River which runs right through Bend. There are companies that set up tube rentals and shuttles to float down this river or you can bring your own. About 4 hours southeast from Portland.
Crater Lake
If you are wondering what the most wild place in Oregon is, and there are some amazingly wild places, then your answer is the massive, pristine lake inside a volcano, which has a tiny volcano inside it called Wizard Island, known as Crater Lake. We suggest camping here and exploring over the course of a few days. Many mountains on top of larger mountains to hike here. There's a mile long trail down the side of the caldera to the water where you can find a ferry to Wizard island where you can then climb up and into the caldera there and truly be able to say you are in a caldera in a caldera. You can jump into the lake BUT they really only recommend doing this until later July and no later than late August. Summer is a very brief season here and there's snow in some places on the mountain year round. Crater Lake is about 4 and a half hours of driving south of Portland.
Sunset Bay State Park in Coos Bay
Travel 6 hours down the Oregon coast stopping through towns like cheesy Tillamook, beautiful Manzinita, and definitely not-"art deco" Newport where you can find some of the most divey dive bars around. You'll eventually come across Coos Bay where you can find Sunset Bay State Park. A nice place to camp and we highly recommend seeing the seals on the rocks and the sprawling garden near the mansion. The drive is a must see for those who have the time to see it. There are many beaches and breathtaking views on this majestic drive.