Here's another update from the Travel Diaries. My friends and I jet setted off to Portland for Memorial Day Weekend a few days ago. It's safe to say I fell in love with this city. One of my (many) New Year's Resolutions this year was to travel more and specifically to hit up Seattle, Portland, and Austin. I was able to get all three off my list in the first half of 2015 and can say with confidence that Portland jumped to the top of my list in a heartbeat. I seriously fell in love with this city to the point of kind of contemplating moving there for a year.... But I'll save that for another post ;) It's funny because no one told me that Portland is more of a town-becoming-a-city vs. a straight up city. I'm actually more of a city girl (or so I thought), so I would never imagine to fall in love with a town but I absolutely did with Portland. The closest hybrid of a comparison I can make is that it's a mix of Seattle, Berkeley, and Davis all in one. Never have I met nicer people in any other place. To the point where we were like "WOW, why is everyone so nice?!" It was so apparent.
Not only that but the pace of life here is so different than anything I'm used to. Not once did I see a hint of anything "techy" while there. No big tech offices, no one glued to their phone while we were out -- it was literally just this sense of all around chillness that we aren't that used to anymore; especially me living in the Bay.
If you know anything about me you know I am a true foodie at heart. And while the food here was indeed bomb there was so much more to the trip that meant more to me than just the culinary adventures. Which is a lot coming from me! Everywhere we went we were surrounded with lush green nature. And this was legit different hues of green everywhere we went.
On our last day my friends and I were talking about our highlights/ favorite parts from the trip. To be honest none of us could come up with only one since there were so many perfect parts that will always stick with me. I'm including my top three below:
1) On our second day we drove up 30 miles out of town to Multhomah Falls to check out the waterfalls. I'm one of those people who hates waiting and I always just want to "get there." This drive, while so ordinary in theory, really hit me on a personal level. The nature surrounding us was so unbelievably beautiful. On my left was this vast body of water surrounded by mountains (so Pocahontas-esque) and on our right was all this moss-covered nature that just had so much character. Being surrounded on all sides by so much beauty just made me realize 1) how amazing God is to create breathtaking sights all around us -- literally had to fly up only an hour to set my eyes on this, and 2) a realization for me to stop rushing. It sounds so corny, that saying, "to stop and enjoy the ride." I always joke that quote shouldn't apply to me because I hate road trips and always get car sick, lol, but really I want to start living that out more in my life when it comes to mentally just enjoying the ride no matter where we are. That car ride and staring at that beauty as I drove to the falls really made me realize that every part of our journey has bits and pieces of beauty that we need to take in and enjoy.
2) Another one of my favorite memories of this trip was the fact that I ran into so many people that I knew while I was there. It's funny because I don't even run into this many people in SF on a daily basis but within 48 hours I saw 4-5 people I knew. Old co-workers, family friends, and acquaintances from all parts of my life. I was on a random residential street on our first day in Portland literally someone screams out my name while she's driving. I turn around and it's one of my old family friends! It was so awesome. I love small world occurrences like that and running into people I know when it's super random so that made the trip so entertaining :)
3) Finally, my other favorite part of this trip was just being able to walk in silence with my friends at certain points and soak it all in. Something I love so much in a friendship is when "awkward silence" isn't even a term in your vocabulary anymore. When you don't feel the need to fill the silence with filler conversation. That's something I loved so much during this trip because it was so evident that we were so comfortable with one another and were all just in our own ways soaking in the sights and beauty. Not only that, but realizing the importance of flexibility when you travel with people. It was amazing because we literally got every single thing on our itinerary done and there was never one complaint among us. We were go go go the whole trip and all of us were on the same page. It's so refreshing. I can safely say this was one of my favorite trips I've taken so far.
Here are some of my favorite photos from the weekend :) Til next time.
