This past weekend we took a trip to Portland, Oregon. Holy smokes was it ever a trip!!
It started off pretty interesting because one of the girls that was supposed to come ended up not being able to, so instead of 6 of us going there were 5. We were trying to decide whether it made sense to try and squish in 1 car, or to split up and take 2 cars. We decided to go with 1 – a Mazda 3, to be exact. So, we have 5 people and 2 dogs. It. Was. Tight. I have no pictures of this because I could not get my hands free to take any!!
Anyway, about ¾ of the way to Portland, we passed an Under Armour outlet store. HOLYYY CRAP! We don’t have those in Canada, so I was exciteeeed. And as I’m sure you know, Greg and I have tried to get everyone and their dog to do the #sweataday challenge, so we thought it would be a wicked opportunity to do a 5 person video in front of the store. Genius, right? Well, maybe not for people who live in the US, since they have these stores everywhere. But for us Canadian folk, it was exciting. 
After our UA shopping spree, we continued on to Portland and stopped at a place called Vista House. The view from this place was unbelievable.
When we finished up at Vista House, we went down the road to check out some waterfalls. Really amazing to see and although the bridge was broken not too long ago from a boulder falling on it – it was still a worthwhile stop!
We made it to our hotel not long after, and got cleaned up for dinner. It was a fairly early night the first night as we were on the road just after 5am. So we were all tired.
Day 2 was Beer Tour day!! Sarah and I started the day with a workout in the hotel gym. We were going to be drinking a LOT of beer later on in the day, so we thought we should start it out right at least! I put her through a variation of Flomasters kick ass skipping/bodyweight circuit!
After that, we took the pups for a walk and hit up two amazing places that we found really close to our hotel. Kure juice bar had the freshest, most delicious juice and smoothie options, and VeggieGrill had an extensive menu of all vegan options. Things like buffalo ‘chicken’ wraps, and burgers. SO tasty. Both places are must visits if you’re in Portland (actually I’m told they have locations anywhere on the west coast!)
Okay, Beer Tour time!! We did a tour that was nearly 5 hours long, and visited 3 breweries. Hopeworks was the first, and was really interesting! It was a brew pup, plus separate tasting room downstairs. Really interesting décor, and delicious beer.
The second place we went to I honestly don’t even remember the name, and it wasn’t that memorable (clearly). The third place we visited was Bridgeport Brewery. It was so cool!! Really different than Hopworks as it seemed quite a bit newer, and was basically a little tasting room and that’s it. But they were so nice in there, really great beer, and a BEAN BAG toss!!! Sarah was all over that! There were a half a dozen guys there for a bachelor party as well, wearing quilts (so rad!) And so we got a couple good pics with them.
That night was a little blurry to be totally honest. We tried over 20 different beers and those tasters aren’t that small!! I’m 125lbs, so that much beer that quickly can do a number on a little lady like me!! Haha I couldn’t find any pictures from the evening of this night, likely because of the blurriness caused by the beer.
Sunday was Easter Morning. Sarah was kinda sad about being out of town for Easter, because she loves to do Easter activities in Van. So I put together a scavenger hunt for her (with all Vegan treats because she’s doing a vegan challenge all this month). I gave her a post it with instructions – the first thing she had to do was 3 sun salutations, and then head down to the concierge to get her next clue.
The concierge was awesome for playing along and gave her the next post it. She had to do 20 burpees (in the middle of the lobby) and 20 squat jumps in order to get the treats that were there for her and move on to her next clue.
I sent her to the gym at the hotel after that,
then to the Starbucks around the corner, and finished at the juice bar for a fresh juice!
Each post it had exercises she had to do before moving on and getting her next clues. She loved it and was really surprised with her hunt!
Later that day we went outside the city and hit up a couple wine spots. Ponzi had a really nice space, and really good wine, but was a little posh for my blood. Sneaky Sarah though purchased a nice bottle of wine for me here as a thank you for the hunt. I am really excited to drink it!! After this we went to a really great Mexican restaurant (although Corey didn’t like his meal) I thought it was dynamite! Although I love any Mexican food so I guess I’m not the best judge. I do not recall the name of the place, but it was so authentic and the margaritas were somethin else!! They gave us a cute little paper made ‘flower’ with chocolate in it that said ‘Happy Easter’.
Once we got back to town, we went to Deschutes for a flight (great beers!) and stopped on the way back to the hotel to do another #sweataday. The seals were of great assistance! (middle pic: Sarah was taking WAY too long to come sit with me, clearly)
On the way home, we stopped at Woodburn outlets, and I definitely don’t have any pics from that as we had a strict 1 hour time limit to boot around several stores (no sales tax – what up! I needed way more than an hour!) When we left the outlets we decided to take the coast home, which added 3+ hours to our drive home, making the total time ~ 12 hours. It was a really long drive.
The coast was beautiful, but definitely not worth the extra several hours of driving – especially since we had 5 people, 3 of which were males, in a Mazda 3, with 2 dogs, for 12 hours.
Overall, amazing trip, would love to be able to go back at some point and check out some of the things we may have missed! Suggestions for next time??
Xxx
Andrea