Road Trip Seattle to San Francisco - Day 6 – 2 Portland Gardens, Aerial Tram, Hubers & wandering

[anji]

Road Trip Seattle to San Francisco - Day 6 – 2 Portland Gardens, Aerial Tram, Hubers & wandering

Hotel Rose (a piece of Pineapple Hospitality!) has a great free shuttle service which will take you anywhere within 3 miles. We had booked to go to the Rose Test Garden and Japanese Garden at 9am. This worked really well and we were there in no time through the morning traffic.

We’d decided to get some breakfast while we were there. We were dropped off at the entrance to the Rose Test Garden but no café – only a street van. We ordered coffee and cookies. The coffee took the longest time and was scalding but worth the wait!

The Rose Test Garden is in the Washington Park area of the city. It also houses the Zoo and many museums as well as great areas for children and is also serviced by the light rail system, the MAX.

There are over 550 different rose varieties here and 7000 plants. They test new roses over 2 years from all over the world for fragrance, disease resistance, colour etc. There’s many sections and we loved the Shakespeare area. Of course June was prime time to go, hence the Rose Festival, but it wasn’t too crowded that early in the day.

When we left we went to the shop for a look around and asked why there are no bees! The answer was that the roses are sprayed – presumably to stop cross pollination and upsetting the guests who don’t like bees (or have allergies). They are sprayed with ‘something niether you or I would ever use in our gardens’ so who knows what it is?

After this it was a 5 minute walk up to the Japanese Garden. This was also a beautiful and peaceful place with many shaded areas of contemplation. There were also enormous Koi carp! There are great views from both gardens over Portland and beyond, including snowy Mount Hood.

There’s a shuttle bus which goes all round Washington Park so we took this to the Zoo to get the MAX back into town and got off at Pioneer Square.

This is beautifully decorated with flowers – all just in pots and placed to make designs on the floor of the square and the steps. These wouldn’t last 5 minutes here at home!

We then spent a couple of hours just wandering. We tracked down two more Grimm locations – the police station and the spice shop – went to the busy Sunday market and got our lunch from the food carts there. We then walked down to the Willamette River where the navy ships were and the City Fair. We had the most enormous, good and cheap ice creams and sat in the sun for a bit watching the kids play in the fountains.

After this we walked along looking at the Rose Parade floats which had been in the Parade the previous day – true works of art.

Back at the Hotel we asked for the Shuttle Bus to take us to the Aerial Tram. This only ran on an afternoon on Sundays. You pay to go up but it’s free to ride down again! It actually goes up to the hospital but there are observation decks too. It holds a lot of people and swung about a bit going over the pylons but the view was wonderful.

Back on the ground we grabbed a coffee before getting the bus back to Pioneer Square. I was busy looking at my phone trying to find the Bath & Body Works when Will said ‘that was Rosalee’. It was actually Bree Turner who plays her in Grimm. Of course she’d passed me by then and had got into her car which was right where we were. I took a sneaky photo but didn’t have the courage to knock on the window!

We found the Bath & Body Works in the Pioneer Place Mall – and they had a 70% off sale on! I had to be careful not to buy too much – like I did in Miami and we had to repack at checkin!

Back to the Hotel and then we went out for dinner at Hubers Cafe. hubers This is the oldest restaurant in Portland and very popular with different rooms to dine in. Will had NY Peppersteak and I chose Beef Stroganoff followed by Crème Brulee (my favourite dessert). Both were delicious. The signature Spanish Coffee is something to watch being prepared even if you don’t have one yourself. True mastery with aim and fire!

We then had a walk round the streets and visited Voodoo Donuts – this was the second time today we’d passed by and the line was just as big with an hour wait. We found the famous Portland White Stag sign and walked over partway over the NE Burnside Bridge.

Finally we had drinks at the Thirsty Lion bar before going back to the hotel. Portland had been great, many a strange sight and we’d love to go back as I think we only scratched the surface. I loved how the houses were different and it’s sense of community pride for such a big place.

Would definitely recommend the Hotel Rose for anyone going to Portland. Fab location on the river, great price of $150 p/n as we booked early and Portland is expensive, valet parking only $20, free cupcakes (!), shuttle bus, free bicycles and generally a bargain for Portland. I loved the decoration too. The Pineapple Hospitality group have hotels in other cities too and I'd certainly use them again.

One more Grimm place to see in the morning and then on to the Columbia River Gorge.

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[Cannavar]

Thanks for that! Another great day.

Although my better half will now know there is a Bath and Body works... best take a spare case!

We did look at the The Rose when planning our trip but some bad reviews for Pineapple hotels in Seattle when we were looking there put us off. Glad it was good for you as it certainly was a great price and the pictures look great. We are staying at the Inn at Northrup Station. Not near the river but looks pretty cool.

[anji]

Wow yes it does look cool too The best thing about shopping in Oregon is that there is NO SALES TAX!

[mick]

Another good day

Joan

[jheaton]

Those gardens look fantastic-what a display

Originally Posted by Cannavar

Thanks for that! Another great day.

Although my better half will now know there is a Bath and Body works... best take a spare case!

We did look at the The Rose when planning our trip but some bad reviews for Pineapple hotels in Seattle when we were looking there put us off. Glad it was good for you as it certainly was a great price and the pictures look great. We are staying at the Inn at Northrup Station. Not near the river but looks pretty cool.

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we stayed there-its quirky but a fab hotel

dont know if they still do it but they gave you a free tram ticket for a day

we could walk to lots of restaurants and microbreweries-Portland has a lot of those!

[MichelleS]

Portland look a fabulous unique place.