Portland {Part 1}

For about the one millionth time . . .  

Josh surprised me last weekend with a trip to Portland for our first anniversary.

I was pumped to say the least. 

I'm still pumped.

Nevertheless, it's over.

We've been day dreaming about Portland's hipsterness and it's food and it's beers for a few years.

We were only there four days but we tried our hardest to take in everything Portland had to offer.

We went to the mountains, went to the coast, and stuffed our faces all along the way.

We spent our Thanksgiving hiking alongside a gorgeous waterfall then having a Thanksgiving dinner picnic (of bread of cheese).

. . . slightly different from the Icelandic puffin Thanksgiving dinner last year, right?

I'll try to keep my recaps of the trip brief, but I'm not making any promises.

Also, I apologize in advance for the grainy selfies, I'm not the biggest fans of asking unqualified strangers to take pictures of us using my DSLR.

An entire row to ourselves on the plane was icing on the already magnificent cake.

Fun fact:

Josh booked our hotel at The Heathman.

He had no idea that it was the hotel from 50 Shades of Grey (I'm also ashamed that I know that).

When I informed him, he was furious and threatened to change to a new hotel.

He quit complaining when we got to the room to find all these sweet treats! 

How awesome are the folks at The Heathman?

We had to start the trip off right, with a local Portland beer sampler at Henry's.

The view from our hotel window was quite lovely.

The leaves of the tree seen below actually turned completely bright yellow by the end of the trip.

The yellow trees and leaves strewn about were probably the highlight of the city for me.

Our first morning started off with Stumptown coffee.

So darn good.

It was connected to the Ace Hotel, which was THE cutest.

Who am I kidding?

Everything about Portland was THE cutest.

We grabbed some snacks at Whole Foods then headed east.

I literally stopped breathing then yelped the first time I caught Mt. Hood in the distance.

Gorgeous, right?

The ride along the Columbia River was a cute one as well.

Stopping by Multnomah Falls was a must.

Thankfully I scoped our a trustworthy stranger who looked like she knew how to work a camera.

We hiked that.

All eleven darn switchbacks of those miles.

It was hard to pay attention to how out of breath we were when there were views like this.

. . . and this

I'm quite the sucker for moss and old wooden fences.

We found a park on the Columbia River to stuff our faces with cheese and bread

. . . which are truly my only Thanksgiving staples anyways, I'm not a turkey and dressing kinda gal.

Then I made Josh take me to the top of the hill outside of Portland so I can see the city and Mt Hood.

This may or may not have involved me climbing on a strangers pile of firewood in their yard.

We had a fancy Thanksgiving dinner at Jake's Seafood (and I went an entire meal without taking pictures of my food)

Actually, that's a lie.

I sent a picture of my green beans to my family with the caption "It wouldn't be a Thanksgiving without a plate full of uneaten green beans."

 Then we found a cute little underground bar and drank the night away. 

Parts 2 and 3 coming soon.

Don't wait up.