The Best Portland, OR Travel Tips From Our Readers

Damn, we’re excited to go back to Portland. Over a hundred commenters gave advice for visiting or living there in this week’s Hack Your City. While rapid growth threatens to stifle what made the city so attractive, for now Portland is still a quirky, fun, easygoing city where it’s hard to have a bad time.

Each Monday on Hack Your City, we ask readers for your best tips on a city: driving tips, restaurant recs, things to do, and any other advice for visitors and locals. Then on Thursday, we present the best comments. We’re working our way around the U.S. and around the globe.

For food, several readers say, don’t worry about hitting the hot spots. “Seriously, there’s only a handful of cities that have this level of quality and consistency in food,” says Dovanator. “You can pretty much choose any place and get a good dining experience and a tasty plate. It really is unbelievable what the basic restaurant has to produce just to keep up.”

Everyone agrees that Powell’s Books (one location on either side of the river) is as cool as you think. Cooler, really, with its multiple floors, semi-hidden rooms, and combination of used and new books. But (almost) everyone agrees just as strongly that Voodoo Donuts is overrated, and you can get better donuts at several other spots. Read on to hear what those spots are.

Food and Drink

• “Go to Dante’s on a Sunday night for their ‘Sinferno.’ Not for the prude…they have light BDSM performance art. They usually have bands or karaoke nights other days of the week, but Sunday night is the best.”—Considerate Charlie
• “Restaurant-wise, Bollywood Theater, Pine State Biscuits and Afuri Ramen.”—Annui13
• “There are plenty of other excellent spots that don’t get a ton of talk: Urdaneta, Olympia Provisions for brunch (reservations!), Swiss Hibiscus, Hat Yai, Trifecta.”—LeBron Jeremy
• “Salt and Straw is pretty good but so is Fifty Licks. Voodoo Donuts tastes like donuts from the grocery store. (Check out Blue Star or Doe Donuts instead). Por Que No is honestly just OK and unless you’re traveling from a place without much Mexican food, this is not the city for it anyway. Instead of Pok Pok, you could go to one of our many Thai restaurants owned by actual Thai people.”—louvella
• “If you have a car, SakeOne, supposedly the first legal sake brewery in the U.S, is about an hour drive west. Worth a trip if sake is your thing.”—DennyCrane
• “Dive Bars: Yamhill Pub, Reel M Inn, Sandy Hut, Low Brow Lounge, Hannigan’s, Lutz, Spare Room.”—PursePeekin
• “Need gluten-free options? SE Portland has both Ground Breaker Brewery, an award-winning gf brewery, and New Cascadia Traditional, a cien por ciento gf bakery. As far as gf beer and bread go, both are legit. And you can walk from one to the other.”—BoteroIsBig
• “One of my favorite things is to take people on our Distillery Row tour, buy a $20 passport and taste something around 40 different locally distilled alcohols!”—Exeros
• “A Great Notion Brewing on NE Alberta is another must-visit for beer nerds. They always have a range of gimmicky-sounding-but-legitimately-delicious unique beers on tap (the Blueberry Muffin and Key Lime Pie sours are personal favorites).”—TheOneWhoKnocks

The flagship location of Powell’s BooksPhoto: Wayne Hsieh

Everything Else

• “The Portland Japanese Garden is incredible. Really five gardens in one place, it is considered to be the finest Japanese garden outside of Japan.”—Silenus
• “Portland is home to over 100 neighborhoods. Most have their own little ‘downtown.’ Check out the strips on Division, Hawthorne, Williams, Mississippi and Alberta.”—abawol01
• “Just outside of town there is a freshwater spring by the side of the highway. You know it’s coming when you see a string of parked cars and then a line of people with jugs waiting to fill up. Oregon natural beauty at its finest.”—Tebow Kneeled First 
• “Hike Dog Mountain if you’re in decent shape. You’ll get an excellent appreciation of the Gorge. If you’re not in shape, Forest Park is very nice and feels like you’re a hundred miles away from a city.”—FJ80
• “The Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden is amazing, even when it’s no longer spring. It’s $5 to get in, but you can manage to get in there for free fairly easily.”—gerrg
• “Pittock Mansion is a must (and you might find yourself getting that “spooky movie” vibe if the weather is just right).”—thatleisguy
• “Being of Japanese descent (my grandparents met in the internment camps), I know of the Oregon Nikkei Legacy Center (Japanese American Historical Plaza) in downtown Portland, but many do not.”—sumo6868
• “If you’d like to be out in nature but don’t have a car, the Hoyt Arboretum, Rose Garden, Japanese Garden, Zoo and Forestry Center are all in the same area and accessible by public transit. $2.50/person to get there, and once you’re there, there’s a free shuttle every 15 minutes that’ll take you around to the different locations.”—Jess
• “If you have one day to rent a car, pick the Gorge, the Coast, or Wine Country, and go. It only takes 1/2-2 hours to get to somewhere stunningly beautiful.”—Alack!Alack!

• “Plenty of people seemed to be surprised that public nudity is not a big deal there, the naked bike ride always got attention every year and there are several nude beaches. Just remember the bug spray!”—Jacob
• “Ladd’s Addition is a great place to walk around. There are four diamond shaped rose gardens, a large central circular park, a few idiosyncratic attractions like the National Hat Museum, and a very comfortable coffee and pastry place, Palio.”—Silenus
• “A lot of what makes Portland ‘beautiful’ is being ruined by new construction and people moving here. Do not mention Portlandia while you’re here. It’s a sore subject.”—taylortylertanner
• “[Intermittent rain], coupled with wind, makes it really impractical for an umbrella. A jacket with a hood is usually sufficient, and most people dress in layers here pretty much year-round. An umbrella might be like a scrunchie in that one season of Sex and the City: absolutely what you would do at home, but it stands out as atypical here.”—bloodlesscoup
• “You HAVE to go to Portland Memorial. It’s one of the largest rambling, weird, crazy mausoleums/crypts in the whole country, and where Chuck Palahniuk based/partly wrote while in the book “Survivor.” You can pretty much get lost in it.”—HominaHomonym2
• “Excalibur Comics on Hawthorne. Almost, but not quite, nothing BUT comics in long boxes on tables. If you want your maquettes, toys, and other dust collectors, go to Things From Another World in Milwaukee; go to Excalibur for your comics.”—Jim
• “Our #1 choice of place to stay in Portland is The Bike Shed Guest House.”—T.J. McChucklenuts
• “I don’t normally advocate spending more time at an airport than is necessary, but PDX is great because they require vendors to use fair pricing: in effect, they cannot charge more inside of the airport than they do outside of the airport. Oh, and there’s a Powell’s Books branch there, too, so grab a book and hang out at Deschutes Brewing.”—Jägs
• “If you fly there anytime before 4pm, DO NOT go directly to Portland. Portland Airport has you already half way to Multnomah Falls. Rent a convertible or something with a sunroof and take the scenic Old Historic highway.”—jsjv

For even more suggestions, check out the original thread, where we’ve collected the best comments under the Staff section. Leave your own tips below here. Come back Monday when we’re off to the Mediterranean!

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