Portland, Oregon – Coffee, Beer & Friendly People

“Hello Passengers, we have now come to a complete stop. Sorry for the short delay. The train has hit a boulder and a hose has detached from the front engine. Once we reattach the hose in about 10 minutes, we should be on our way.”

The wait was a little longer than 10 minutes and after about an hour and no success, the driver called ahead and asked that a spare carriage from a nearby freight train be sent to help us with the rest of our journey. About 15 minutes later the driver informed us that the onboard engineer had managed to fix the problem, the train now had brakes again (yay!) and that we would be on our way again shortly. The 18 hour train trip from San Francisco to Portland was significant for other reasons as well. It was the first time that this particular train trip had been taken in about 3 months due to a massive mudslide that occurred under the heavy winter snow. Locals say that the past winter was one of the worst they can remember. Lucky for us, the weather in Portland has been overcast but fine.

The Hostelling International Portland Northwest is housing us during our stay. A pleasant place with super helpful staff and full kitchen facilities, which we have been trying to make some use of in an attempt to stem the gradually expanding waistlines that have resulted from too many restaurant served meals.

A couple of facts to set the scene:
- Oregon has 64 brewing companies, operating 90 brewing facilities.
- Oregon is the second largest grower of hops in the United States.
- 41 percent of all tap beer consumed in Oregon is brewed in Oregon.
- Portland has 32 breweries operating within its city limits, more than any other city in the world.

Oregon is a State known for a few things: forestry; tax-free shopping (Oregon is one of only 2 States in the US that doesn’t impose sales tax); green lifestyles; good coffee; and handcrafted beers. There are a plethora of coffee shops and micro breweries in Portland, and unlike other major American cities, you have to look a little harder to find a Starbucks coffee shop or Budweiser on tap (thank heavens for that). We have been taking advantage of these attractive lifestyle features throughout our stay, starting every day with a coffee and finishing it with a couple of Oregon’s finest brews. When you can buy a 6-pack of excellent beer for around $6.50, you’d be silly not too.

Portland has a lot of similarities with Adelaide. It’s fairly small, has a grid layout, a river running through it and it doesn’t have a suite of ‘tourist icons’ that are must see or do experiences. Hence we have spent most of our time just exploring. We jumped on a tram and went across the Williamette River to the fringe of the burbs and had a look around the Lloyd Centre shopping mall. It’s the largest mall in Oregon - which doesn’t really count for much because it’s not that big - but what struck us most was how the shape of the people changed in a matter of a few kilometres. In central Portland, people are pretty healthy, fit looking and obviously conscious of what they eat (hence all the health, vegan and green food places), but at the mall it was your stereotypical American population - huge waistlines, morbid obesity and seriously fat kids who are doomed to a life of ill health and public ridicule. Once we’d had a look around, we went back to our ivory tower for a soy burger and wheatgrass shot.

Today we went on an underground tour of Portland. The story goes that in the late 1800s it was difficult to recruit sailors on account of the awful pay, poor living conditions and hard manual work. Hence, in many port cities in the US, the phenomenon known as ‘Crimping’ or ‘Shanghaiing’ was born. Basically, men with no social conscience would seek out young fit men, render them unconscious either through alcohol, drugs or a blow to the head, and then sell them to ship captains in need of labour. Once the victims were released from the hull of the ship miles out to sea, they basically had a choice - work or swim. Portland is one of the more famous locales for crimping due to the stories of secret underground tunnels being used to trap, store and transport victims. Whilst you are left to decide for yourself whether or not an elaborate network of tunnels was used for this purpose, the conclusion seems to be that the tunnels were generally used for the legitimate storage and movement of goods, and that the widespread corruption in Portland at the time meant that it was probably easier to buy off the authorities and simply wheel the unconscious bodies through the streets to the waterfront.

Portland is doing a lot in regards to sustainability and being green, something that was also very evident in San Francisco. They are developing and extending their light-rail system, and the entire public transport system is free within the downtown area. Like San Francisco, it is super bike friendly. There are spots on each tram carriage to hang your pushbike - bike friendly and space saving for other commuters. We all like to stick the boot into the Americans about being the largest greenhouse emitters in the world (maybe second now behind China, but the jury is still out on that one), but what has really struck us here is how much money is being invested by the cities we have visited to address the issue. If the US Federal Government are still climate change sceptics, the powers that be within the states certainly aren’t.

Oregon is the next major state for the US presidential primary, so there is a bit of a buzz around the place. Hillary Clinton was in Portland earlier this week, and you see a few party organisers around the place trying to shore up support. The Oregon press is so excited that they will actually have some influence over the result - usually it’s all been decided by the time the primaries swing by Oregon, much like it is with the Republicans, but not this time. Hillary is still holding on for dear life. We’ve found Hillary’s campaign office, but we are still on the search for Barack’s.

Seattle now awaits our arrival. The home of alt legends like Soundgarden, Nirvana and Pearl Jam, the birthplace of Starbucks, endless miserable weather, and reportedly the highest suicide rate in the United States. Melancholy faces ready - Seattle, here we come!

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