When You Have Just One Day

When you have just one overnight, one day only, you plan the best. You begin with a lovely, slow Sunday just eating, playing games, and exploring together. And that's what Mi'ja, her partner, Pat, Enrique and I did. They organized a really nice day that, in her note to me, "included super vegetarian/vegan friendly restaurants, all locally farmed, and famed for deliciousness." Enrique, if he hadn't noticed before, discovered that, just like in Spain, it's all about the food.

The links take you to the actual names and places, that include menus for the below mentioned fabulous eateries.

Most of the following quotes are by Alexander Barrett, This is Portland: The City You've Heard You Should Like
"This is Portland is a first-hand look at a city that people can't seem to stop talking about. It's a guidebook of sorts, but not to restaurants and sightseeing. Instead, Alexander Barrett is your friendly guide to the quirky characters and atmosphere of Portland, Oregon and how fun, beautiful, and ridiculous it can be. With its approachable, often hilarious tone, this book is perfect for anyone who wants to learn more about bikes, beards, beers, rain, and everything else important about the city you've heard you should like." - Amazon Review

11:30am - Met for brunch at Harlow's (3632 SE Hawthorne St)

Harlow's was awesome for lunch. Enrique and I were lucky since we had happened in just few days earlier when we stopped with my dear friend Wendy for a coffee and hot chocolate.

12-5ish - Explore Hawthorne District! Lots of thrift stores, coffee shops, book stores, very "Portland" vibes. Good thing for the GPS most of our visit. It wasn't necessary once we got to Hawthorne Street, though. No matter where we looked there was something to see. We visited the vintage shops a bit and had fun with the funky, but being old thrifters we weren't having the high prices. What we were having was enjoying the atmosphere, the kind of apparel that earns Portland it's reputation.

Keep Portland Weird - #1Bumper Sticker
Locals don't think it's weird or know what it means exactly - the city is too nice. Maybe it's the annual naked bike ride, aging hippies, weird hats, art and punk shows... 

Standing in line to have Fight Club signed by author Chuck Palahniuk. After some wait we finally made it into Memento, but there discovered that the signing was only for those who also opted to purchase Bait, his new colouring book for adults. *Emigrantes was a book I gifted Mi'ja, an early birthday present of sorts, the Spanish version of The Arrival, by Shaun Tan:

*In a heartbreaking parting, a man gives his wife and daughter a last kiss and boards a steamship to cross the ocean. He's embarking on the most painful yet important journey of his life- he's leaving home to build a better future for his family.
Shaun Tan evokes universal aspects of an immigrant's experience through a singular work of the imagination. He does so using brilliantly clear and mesmerizing images. Because the main character can't communicate in words, the book forgoes them too. But while the reader experiences the main character's isolation, he also shares his ultimate joy. - Goodreads

The kind of place to bring Spanish cards for Chinchón and play them at a donut & coffee shop.

Hawthorne v. Belmont
H. by far the hippest street in the SE and home of every bad P. stereotype: Lazy 20 somethings, crazy homeless, the dirtiest hippies, the loudest petitioners, buskers every 10 ft., fashionable parents w/widest strollers available in the US, ALL out there! Makes you feel like a raging neo-conservative, "Get a job!, Hey try some birth control!" Belmont on the other hand is the good Portland stereotype: great restaurants, green, cool parents w/normal strollers, ...

At the Cider Ale House Enrique and I had our first "Flight" of drinks.

For dinner head over to the Pearl District at Verde Cocina (524 NW 14th St)
Ice-cream after dinner at Salt and Straw

Monday 4/10
9am - Breakfast of cream-of-wheat and fruit at our Airbnb.
11:30am - Head to airport for good-byes.