This year for Spring Break our son, Billy Martin III (B3) and his girlfriend (Tatiana) have come to visit us here in Portland for 8 days. I took off the entire upcoming week myself, planned out the entire visit, packing each day with a multitude of activities around the area to keep them busy, to show off everything Portland has to offer, to revisit some sites I’ve already enjoyed and add some new experiences to my list. This is the first of seven (7) posts that will chronicle our week.
We started off Saturday morning, leaving the house early, headed to Washington Park and the Portland Japanese Garden.
As I showed a couple weeks ago, every time I visit the garden it presents a different view. Last time the snow was pouring down and this time the trees were budding, but the flowers weren’t quite ready to bloom. I think with another two weeks of time my next visit should be pretty spectacular.
Still, this visit we got in during members’ hours (as I always try to do), so very few ankle biters were running around screaming in what is supposed to be a Zen-like atmosphere, and I was able to capture a few short video clips without their ill-timed cackling.
Additionally, while B3 visited the garden with me in December, this was Kay’s first visit. She had a great time and plans to take advantage of our yearlong membership with me, coming back often, so that made it even more enjoyable.
We had a reservation at the Umami Cafe for the tea service at 10am. We got in a few minutes early and enjoyed the tea and pastries. B3 also had a flight of mochi ice cream and Kay enjoyed the miso soup with rice done exactly the way she likes it.
A visit to the Pittock Mansion afterward was not on my original schedule. While I thoroughly enjoyed my behind-the-scenes tour that I posted about a couple weeks ago, I didn’t expect a couple early 20-somethings and my wife would enjoy it. However, they all said they wanted to go on the self-guided tour inside.
I bought them all tickets while I walked the grounds outside during their 15-20 minutes inside, getting a view of Mt Hood over downtown Portland from the Mansion’s front yard.
After they emerged happy to have gone on the tour and we walked around some more we all concluded it was time for brunch. Not wanting to miss the opportunity to show off a new place that I had discovered that I had thoroughly enjoyed the last time I was there, I took the family to Sweet Bacon Cafe. As should be expected, they were packed and there was a line. However, I noticed two perfectly placed tables on the front porch, each with two seats, so I offered to split our party and they sat us immediately, leaving the other 10-12 people ahead of us in what appeared to be 2-3 groups aghast.
While we were right next to each other, because we sat at separate tables, I didn’t have an opportunity to get photos of what the kids ordered and had to use photos from the restaurant’s website. They had the Chick Pops (Crispy fried chicken and waffle bites with maple syrup. Served with spicy mayo) and the Crispy Chicken Benedict (Cherry tomato, red bell pepper, onion, spicy hollandaise sauce).
B3 was kind enough to give me a sampler of both. I will definitely order the chicken and waffles app the next time I’m there, but I found the Chicken Benedict very flavorful and crispy as advertised, but also a little greasy and heavy and I felt like I would never be able to finish it if I ever ordered it. B3 completely disagreed with me on those points though.
I ordered up the Sunrise French Toast with a side of their thick cut bacon and two eggs cooked perfectly over easy, and I helped Kay decide on the Farmer’s Scramble (Tofu, baby kale, onion, mushroom, tomato, red bell pepper.) with a side of house potatoes and a massive piece of ciabatta toast.
As happens quite often, when the food arrived she decided she wanted my French Toast instead. Luckily, because (as of next month, 24 years of being married) I am always prepared for something like this, I helped her pick something I could eat if I had to (like something without shrimp).
While the day was early all were in a bit of a comatose state after that super delicious brunch, so we needed to head off to our next destination to get in a little more exercise. We were bound for the Lan Su Chinese Garden in Portland’s Chinatown.
It may have been the fact that the Chinese Garden is downtown instead of in the hills above the city, so it gets more sunlight and warmth, or maybe it was just because there were different plants in both locations, but the Chinese Garden had a lot more examples of flowering bushes and trees than the Japanese Garden this morning.
Given that the Chinese Garden takes up only a single square block our visit was very peaceful and pleasant, and lasted only about 30 minutes, then we were off to our next destination for a little action, Ground Kontrol Classic Arcade.
B3 and I played this crazy Atari Pong tabletop game that was a cross between video pong and air hockey.
I didn’t see the women’s restroom door, but I’m hoping the sign on it was Ms. Pacman.
(This visit may be familiar to readers of my previous articles so far, as this has mostly mirrored my Saturday a couple weeks ago. I found those activities to be things that I wanted to share with the family, and they all seemed to enjoy them, so I’d say mission accomplished, and I didn’t mind the repeats myself).
For something that I hadn’t experienced yet to date, we headed down to the waterfront. On the way we navigated past one of the best (but not the best - that belongs to Blue Star in my opinion) doughnut stores in Portland, Voodoo Doughnuts. Even in the late afternoon there was a long line of tourists meandering out in the “hot” 75-degree Portland sun waiting to buy their unique doughnuts, because as the sign says, “Good things come in pink boxes”
and, “The magic is in the hole”.
The doughnut store is right at the entrance to Portland Saturday Market where hundreds of vendors hawk their wares every Saturday and Sunday from March through Christmas Eve along the Willamette River.
It’s also where the cherry trees grow, offering some great photographic moments this time of year along the riverfront.
We made our way back through the market and before reaching the car we ran into one of the many food carts in Portland serving up some of the best street food one can consume. El Paraiso is one of those Mexican joints serving up $2.50 street tacos that blow you away. We each got one. I picked the pastor and Kay chose the shrimp taco (I was so enamored with our tacos I didn’t stop to take pics, so these are representative photos from another diner online, and here’s a YouTube link to check out their cart)
At this point it was getting on in the day and everyone was starting to wear down, so with one more stop on the agenda we headed south along the waterfront to the Portland Aerial Tram station. I didn’t capture any pictures (this one below is from our livingroom last November to remind readers what we’re talking about). We paid the $8 per person for the round trip up the hill to the University/Hospital, exited the tram, went back through the turnstiles and headed back down all in about 10 minutes time. Box checked. Tourist trap visited.
To really wrap up the day we headed over to Dough Zone Dumpling House (A chain located across the West Coast and Houston) for dinner. While I’m told there are authentic local dumpling houses here in Portland (and I fully expect that to be the case) I have yet to experience them. This restaurant is located on the waterfront right next to the hotel we stayed in when we first moved here. I ate there, became enamored with it, and just haven’t taken the opportunity to branch out yet in this food genre to what I expect are even better dumping houses around the city. Time will tell.
The food came out so fast after ordering and it went into our mouths so quickly, I didn’t have time to take any pics. This is I think the fourth time I’ve eaten here and everything on the menus is just incredible. We ordered a little of everything across the noodles, pancake rolls, Berkshire pork-stuffed soup dumplings, oh and the Sweet and Sour Cucumber is out of this world (we ended up getting another two orders of that to go). For family and friends back in California there are several locations down in San Jose and the surrounding Bay Area that you definitely should check out.
With full bellies and fun times behind us we finished off the first day of Spring Break 2024, having visited some of the most iconic Portland area sites.
As a sneak peek for tomorrow, we’ll be headed to something I knew nothing about before a couple days ago, and that was suggested by the kids, Hopscotch Portland. Should be a blast.